


A New World

by alexandertheII



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling, Star Wars Legends - All Media Types
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-08
Updated: 2020-10-24
Packaged: 2021-03-06 05:47:24
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 25
Words: 102,944
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25788310
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/alexandertheII/pseuds/alexandertheII
Summary: As his and Voldemort's spells collide during the Battle of Hogwarts, not all is as it seems. Yes, the Dark Lord is defeated, but something weird happens to Harry, too. Without having a real explanation as to why, he is thrust into an alien world. Some would let this development crush their spirit, that was never something he was good at letting happen. Instead, it becomes a chance.Now complete, work on the sequel well underway.
Relationships: Leia Organa/Harry Potter
Comments: 20
Kudos: 167
Collections: 5 stars





	1. Fragmented

**Author's Note:**

> Hi all,  
> From what was originally just a small plot-bunny, this has grown to quite the story, with twenty chapters already waiting to be published.  
> This will be a Harry Potter/Star Wars crossover, beginning at around 1 BBY, although Harry will only really go ‘galactic’ in 0 BBY, before the destruction of the first Death Star. That being said, this first chapter is, let’s call it unspecific. Being intellectually lazy, it allows me to justify a whole host of crossovers and might therefore be used again in the future.  
> This will be Legends canon mostly, although I won’t discount data from Disney canon material, as long as it does not contradict what has been there before. Given that the old Star Wars Extended Universe was a vast place, obviously some people will have trouble with understanding some references. Fear not, you can write me a PM (or a comment, really doesn’t matter all that much), and I will include it in the glossary I shall be providing in time.  
> Last but not least, I know the mouse is protective of its copyright, so if anyone at Disney (or associated with HP, obviously) has a problem with me publishing this, I will naturally take it down. However, I’ll have it being said that this is not for profit, only for the enjoyment of me and my readers, as well as my betterment as a writer.

The pain was almost indescribable as it permeated Harry’s being to his very core. He had no idea where, or even if he really was. Neither did he know, what he really was. Chaotic images were flashing before his eyes, all in sequence, yet multiple at the same time. It would have been dizzying, had there not been that incredible pain sharpening his every sense.

And by that fact alone he knew that it was not an inordinate amount of time that had passed when he came to, at least partly, because he had enough experience with pain to know that, in the short run, it would wake up every fibre of one’s being, but tended to, in the long run, deaden the mind to everything.

A shudder flooding his mind, Harry Potter emerged from the pit of that pain, only to find himself with a novel, utterly disconcerting sensation. Being in more than one spot at a time was certainly new. Before the novelty had any real chance of wearing off, he realised something else: he was in multiple times as well. With supreme concentration, the kind of which he usually reserved for trying to stay awake during History of Magic classes, if he even bothered to do that, he managed to home in on the moment he felt this whole mess originated from.

He watched with a strange kind of detachment as, in the blink of an eye that might as well have been hours, the two spells raced toward each other, the eyes around the Great Hall all fixated on that very moment. Harry saw the brief expression of confusion on his other self’s face, that one little sign of whatever phenomenon it was that had led to his current situation. However, instead of stopping, his vision only grew, and with it, that dizzying feeling of seeing multiple strings of images returned and intensified.

Harry watched, while in front of him, he and Ginny both found the love they had both wanted desperately; he also watched them never get together again and break up shortly after the war. Had he had any kind of body worth speaking of, he was sure he did not, he would have started rubbing his temples in agony. With a strange detachment, he watched himself fall in love with Hermione, of all people, after consoling her following another fight with Ron, fuelled by their vastly different personalities. And he watched himself die, alone, drunk, at the age of 22, no longer able to cope with the shadows of a war he had not expected to see the end of. It was all running in parallel, and the emotional weight should have been strangling, paralysing even, but all there was, was that detached feeling, as if he was merely an outside observer.

Watching his and others’ lives pass by, he learned a lot, but he could also feel, that the knowledge was empty. Sure, wherever he might end up, if he did end up anywhere at all it might be useful. He was not only going forward either, something that he understood when he saw a young Dumbledore in front of him. There was, however, one important observation he made: he himself, the presence that defined itself as Harry Potter in that… whatever it was, was not living these things. He was not rearing children or carrying loved ones to their graves. He was still merely an observer while other selves lived these lives.

And with a sudden jolt, all of it was whisked away from him; the knowledge of what he had learned, remained, the images and memories remained, at least somewhat, but there was nothing new that was coming in. A mighty shudder passed through his being, and Harry James Potter finally truly awoke.


	2. A Brave New World

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: The Star Wars and Harry Potter copyrights lie with their respective owners, should any of them have any problem with my story being shared, I will comply with their wishes and remove it from circulation.  
> Please do not copy this work or any part of it.

The first thing Harry noticed, as he awoke, was the oppressive feeling to the air around him. No, more than that; the very existence around him had this feeling about it.

With a groan, he managed to push open his eyes, which was a good thing, really; poised to strike, right next to where he was lying on the ground was a green snake, its hide adorned in alternating red and yellow rings. Out of an instinct more than any conscious decision, he simply reacted.

**“Stop!”** Harry ordered the snake, hearing the hissing sound he had come to associate with parseltongue. Unexpectedly, the snake did indeed stop.

“Right, at least that worked,” he muttered, before adding in parseltongue, **“Where am I?”**

The snake just stared at him for a few moments, probably completely stumped by the fact that it had a human talking to it. _“Nest,”_ it finally hissed back, making him think that the snakes he had met and talked with might just have been more of an anomaly, rather than the rule as far as intelligence and self-awareness went.

After clearing his head with another hearty shake of the very same body part, at least as far as that was possible, he started taking stock of his surroundings. Harry could only describe the environment as a lush jungle, the moist air feeling thick enough to be cut with a knife, and not a sharp one at that, while the noise that permeated everything was both alien and beautiful, even in a rather deadly way. With that done, he turned his gaze inwards, so to speak, to take stock of himself; no wand, so that was a bad start. While he had no idea how he had landed here, wherever that was, he had full knowledge of what had happened… in between.

A heavy groan on his lips, Harry rifled through his brain for the bits of wandless magic he had learned, watched and, in a weird sense, experienced. It took him dozens of failed tries, in which he was pushing as hard as he could on his magic, trying to will it outward. After the 37th try, he finally managed to make a small indentation into the ground. It was nothing much, but it was a start.

It took until the sun was already dangerously close to the horizon, for him to finally complete his ‘project’: a small ditch in the terrain, around which rose walls of compacted dirt. He just about managed to cast some of Hermione’s signature blue flames and order the snake to guard him, before he collapsed on the raised slab of stone, he half-heartedly called a bed before he fell into a deep sleep.

OOOOOOOO

There were more images flittering along in front of his eyes now; nothing coherent, or in any way comprehensible, but somehow, they were still feeling comfortable. They gave off a feeling of contentedness and belonging he rarely felt around anyone other than Hermione, maybe the Burrow.

Harry awoke to the cacophony of the thick forest, still smothering the area in its oppressive blanket of sound. Next to the still dancing flames of the fire, the snake had rolled up and was dutifully watching the entrance for any other predators, or whatever else might be a danger. With the creak of protesting joints, the dark, if rather unruly-haired man got up and once again tried to get an honest impression of his situation; it was bleak, to say the least. He had nothing to eat, no idea where he was, or even when, did not even have a wand, though the wandless transfiguration of the previous day had been a good start, and only the clothes on his back. It went without saying that, after the battle at Hogwarts, they were rather filthy and threadbare.

Despite all of this, he felt strangely at peace; he had, after all, seen himself and his friends live out their lives, and they had been happy, for the most part. Harry did not really have it in himself to question what he had seen; the weirdest things always did happen to him, so why not something like this as well.

Whatever this was.

A tired groan on his lips, he had slept on a stone slab after all, Harry stepped in front of his small shelter, the definitely poisonous snake on his heels. That gave him an idea.

_“You hungry?”_ he hissed at the small reptile. It was only fair to include it, after being guarded by the creature all night. The snake nodded eagerly, before quickly slithering off on the direction of some of the smaller trees. Harry, for his part, decided he might as well follow his ‘local guide’.

The destination of their short trek turned out to be a grouping of undergrowth, even denser than the surrounding woods and shrubs. From between the leaves, Harry could just make out the sound of small feet on the loose earth. Following an insane urge, fuelled by one of the things he had witnessed during what he now decided to call the Scattering, because, why not, he clearly enunciated, “Avada Kedavra!”

There was none of the malice behind the spell that people usually associated with it, just a deep wish for it to be over quickly for the unfortunate animals that would end up filling the gnawing hole in his stomach.

**“Will you eat what I have killed?”** he suddenly asked his companion that had now coiled up his leg. Again, the violently coloured snake nodded, and Harry spoke the incantation another two times, before he summoned the carcasses out of the undergrowth. They looked like small rodents, now that he could finally clearly see them. The clearly panicky sounds from the other members of their herd unnerved him to no end. He supposed he would be unnerved as well, had a mysterious predator just killed three of his kin and somehow floated them away.

With at least a bit of supplies now available to him, the displaced wizard returned to his campsite, where he began the unfortunate duty of preparing the animals for a meal. He supposed they might have been poisonous, although he did not really think so; still, being poisoned was infinitely more preferable to slowly starving to death, he decided. It was bloody, disgusting work, although not something Harry had never done before during their year-long exile and hunt for the horcruxes. He made liberal use of cutting and cleaning charms, each of them taking dozens of times to make work without his wand, and they were not even that strong. Thankfully, having witnessed hundreds of different wands being made and wand-lore being crafted, he had the knowledge to make one, even if he was certain it would take him a few tries to get the actual physical aspect right.

A snort escaped his lips; he did not even know whether there were any suitable trees and cores around. Still, even the most barebones focus would be a step up.

His musings were interrupted by a high whining; above the jungle, he could just about make out three weirdly formed flying objects coming down from the higher levels of the atmosphere. Even with his limited knowledge, they should not be able to fly, but instead be dropping like bricks. One of them even looked like a concrete brick with three wings attached in the form of a three-pronged star. The other two were just balls, attached to two vertical surfaces that were definitely oriented the wrong way to be providing any amount of lift. It was a sign of civilisation, as much was sure. Still, with their definitely unearthly appearance, and also just in general, these things gave Harry a bad feeling.

_“Huh, unearthly,”_ he mused somewhat dispassionately. _“That would be weird, even for me.”_

It was a worthy thought, although he also would not put it past the yankees to cook up something weird like this in one of their secret black projects. The Communists might not be around, anymore, but there was just too much money involved to just drop the whole military-industrial-complex out of the window. At least that was what some of the knowledge he had picked up told him.

With the three animals he had caught finally prepared, he cut one up and fed it to the snake, piece by piece, while the other ones were slowly cooking over the blue flames, held up by a levitation charm that had, once again, taken an obscene amount of time and effort to cast.

OOOOOOOO

Another good, long look at his surroundings had told Harry how incredibly exposed he was. Well, maybe exposed was the wrong word. After all, he was surrounded by a dense, green forest. Nonetheless, it would be dangerous, staying where he could not see anyone or anything approaching. His new reptilian companion was the only proof he needed for that.

Therefore, he had spent the rest of the day fighting his way through the jungle toward a rather sparse hill he had made out in the distance. What he had first though would take only an hour, two at the worst, turned out to be five. It was not the distance itself that made the endeavour extremely annoying, but the thickness of the shrubbery on the ground. It meant he rarely had a straight path toward his target. Still, he managed to reach the peak of the surprisingly large outcropping when the sun over his head was already starting to redden the world around him. Tired, both mentally and physically, he conjured more of the blue flames, and erected a slightly more elaborate shelter than he had before. His wandless magic was getting better, and while he hoped he would have the opportunity to craft himself a wand, or better yet buy one from somewhere, it would tide him over.

Blue flames dancing at his feet, he sat in front of the earthen shelter and took stock of his surroundings, once again. That was the moment he did a double take.

_“So, definitely not earth,”_ he thought, although it did not do much to surprise him, really. On the horizon, opposite the setting sun, two moons were visible, a giant, and a small one, silently rising above the surface. Strangely untroubled, Harry managed to get himself onto the new slab of stone parodying a bed, and promptly fell asleep, troubled again by chaotic visions.

OOOOOOOO

The warm rays of the rising sun were what woke him up the next day. With a wave of his hand, Harry extinguished the blue flames still flickering in the small indentation on the ground, while the serpent again coiled its way up his leg. However, this time it went even higher, draping itself around his shoulders and left arm.

In the clear light of the morning, Harry could make out that he was indeed at the very edge of an enormous mass of trees, stretching beyond his visual range to the south, or what he assumed would be south on Earth, given the way the sun moved along the sky. To the east, he could see a few rivers ending in one large delta, finally spewing murky water into the sea just about visible on the horizon. And there, on the edge of one of these rivers, smoke was rising from what looked like a village. That find did not elicit the feeling of elation he had expected, though. He had no mind to meet anyone at the moment, be they alien or human. And if he died on this planet, so what.

He had seen himself live his life and was certain these Harrys were just as real as he was. That was after already having accepted death once before.

No, compared to the inhospitable jungle to the south, and the uninviting prospect of meeting people to the west, the grassland stretching out to north-eastward was infinitely more inviting. Having gotten a more reasonable idea of how long a trip through the dense forest would take, Harry estimated at least four hours until he reached the edge, and the grumbling in his stomach reminded him that taking on that hike unprepared and unnourished would be a bad idea.

Therefore, he repeated his actions of the previous day, while also gathering a few berries he magically deemed edible. He let himself be guided by some of the knowledge now imprinted in his mind from the things he had witnessed. Although now that he had time to process it, it was not really knowledge at all. It was more a perfectly recounted memory of acquiring that knowledge, somewhat like what he had heard about eidetic memory, the difference being that it included more than just visual information. Still, it was incredibly useful, nonetheless, and it told him to not simply throw away possibly valuable resources by just tossing out the hide and bones of the small animals he hunted. Conjuration and transfiguration could only get you so far.

And so, before he knew it, more than half the day had passed with hunting, skinning and eating. Unwilling as he was to do the trek to the edge of the forest too close to dark, Harry instead immersed himself in the recounting of the life and work of a wizard who had been running a tannery in medieval times. It seemed like a completely random person to witness, although the young wizard felt as if he had at least some kind of connection to the man. He watched and copied carefully, as the leatherworker used his magic to carefully dry the hides he had to work with, just like he himself was now doing. Before long, he had three patches of dried skin laid out before him, ready to be processed. As chance would have it, or probably simple convenience, the man’s wife had been an avid user of her husband’s product, often using what he made to fashion various accessories and useful things for the other villagers.

It was a crude thing, in the end, but Harry had managed to make a small bag from the hide of the rodent-like creatures, and he was rather pleased with himself, despite the copious amounts of wasted materials lying around him in tatters. To top it all off, he immersed himself in the mind of a rune-master that he somehow knew lived in a possible future of Earth, diligently following the man in his work to apply an extension and featherlight enchantment on the small box he was working with. The memories told him that the dried skin would not be the best material to hold and channel large amounts of magic, but he did not have much choice in the matter, really. Having finished up the etchings for the featherlight enchantment, he put down the crude stone he had used to carve the cuneiform script before another idea came to him, and he began rifling through the rune-master’s memories for one other enchantment he wanted to put on this thing.

Another two hours later, his stomach was already growling again, and strongly so. He made short work of the remaining meat and berries, before he fell asleep again.

OOOOOOOO

The next morning, Harry woke up rather early, even before the sun had started shining into his shelter and prepared for the day by trying out some more wandless transfiguration, this time of his clothes. Soon, he was decked out in more appropriate attire, a pair of long tan pants and long-armed shirt, with a wide-brimmed hat to top it off. He did not waste a lot of time with food, that morning, quickly killing a few of the same animals and gathering some more of the berries. While sitting in front of the fire, he nibbled on a few of the red, sweet fruits, enjoying the fresh taste against the backdrop of an already hot day. With one of the animals in his stomach and the others safely contained in a stasis enchantment, the last one he had crafted the day before, he set off northward.

The snake slung around his shoulders was dutifully watching their surroundings for any possible danger, somewhat offsetting the definite feeling of danger permeating around the two of them, up until reaching the grasslands. That was when the feeling of danger became a certainty of danger.

Not far away enough by any stretch of imagination, there was a herd of huge beings, mostly brown in colour, with long, sharp claws and rather imposing teeth. Sized somewhere between a troll and a giant, they looked a bit like a disturbing cross between a grizzly bear and a potato.

Worst of all, they definitely knew he was there.

And why should they not be storming in his direction, after all; they were definitely armed and more than five times his size. Also, there were five of them. Still, going down without a fight was not something Harry Potter did, at least not if there was nothing to be gained from it.

He threw out all the offensively applicable magic he knew, up to and including the killing curse, but only one of the giant beasts fell, dead before it hit the ground. Harry dearly hoped that it had died from the acid green curse he had thrown last; at least that one killed painlessly. The other four however, were still barrelling down on him. All of them had cuts and scrapes from the cutters he had sent their way, but they had not been slowed down even a bit.

It was at that moment, that Harry let his short life, as well as the other ones he had observed, pass before his eyes with perfect clarity. There was too much to remember in an instant, but it turned out, he did not have to.

Without his immediate notice, the snake that had been slung around his shoulders had let itself fall down and, with surprising speed, slithered through the tall grass toward the tallest and meanest looking of the whole bunch. Without much consideration for its own safety, the serpent proceeded to bite deeply into the raw flesh uncovered by one of Harry’s spells. The large predator wailed in agony, and immediately threw off the bothersome reptile, but the damage was already done as the obviously painful venom began to work its way through the large body. Highly motivated by their leader’s pained wails, the remaining three beasts tucked tail and barrelled into the opposite direction of Harry and his companion.

Within minutes, the giant animal was on the ground, paralysed but obviously still in such agony, it did not bear watching. Again, feeling that overwhelming sense of sadness and mercy, Harry raised his hand in front of one of the wounds and cleanly intoned, “Avada Kedavra.”

Without any more pain, the predator was dead, while the somewhat dazed-looking snake, if a that was even possible, had soon found its way back onto Harry’s shoulders. Intensely doubtful that he would manage to store the huge carcasses in his bag, he simply fired off the strongest cooling charm he could manage without a wand, before erecting another simple shelter and falling asleep.

OOOOOOOO

He woke up to a number of weird noises: tearing, a kind of splatting. Worried about getting into another situation like the one the day before, he let his serpentine companion glide up his left arm, head close to the hand, so it would be able to strike quickly. He himself had a cutter on his tongue as he stepped out of the small hut, only to be faced with a large, bipedal reptile munching its way into the cadaver of the beast the snake had incapacitated.

The dinosaur-like creature had blue scales, a box-shaped head and small arms, barely usable given their size. In all, it was another thing that looked like a cross between two different things, only this time it was a mix between velociraptor and T. rex, only a lot smaller than the latter. Obviously having heard the human’s approach, the reptile’s head sped around, its bloodred eyes focussing on Harry; the last time he had seen eyes even remotely like this had been Tom Riddle, but in contrast to the dark sorcerer’s bloodshot orbs, these looked somewhat natural. They definitely belonged in this being.

A deep rumbling erupted from the visitor as it turned to Harry, cautiously stepping closer. Despite the very prominent, dark teeth he raised his arm in an inviting gesture, and the large reptile pushed the top of its cobalt-blue head into the wizard’s waiting hand, as if wanting to be petted. Unwilling to anger a being such as this, Harry complied and lightly petted the iridescent scales,

“Wicked,” he commented his new friendship.

Over the following days, the saurian, as Harry had called the being, stuck around, piece by piece devouring the carcass of the potear (potato + bear=potear), but leaving the tough skin as intact as possible. The young wizard, meanwhile, spent his time with making as much use of the resources he had as he could. That meant skinning the two giant beasts and storing as much of the second one that the saurian was not eating in his bag. With the hide, he managed to make himself an actual backpack, complete with shoulder straps, and the needed room to actually store a good deal of stuff. Still, as cushy as it might have been, relatively speaking of course, Harry was aware it could not last.

His last fight with the potears had only ended the way it did due to extreme luck, something he was not willing to chance again. He had been relying on his luck for too long already. Therefore, five days after arriving at the edge of the forest, there was only one more thing for Harry to do: he wanted to make himself a wand. Following the fight with the herd of potears, he had speculated how exactly they had managed to not fall by the killing curse, intimately familiar as he was with the power this magic brought to bear. The only answer he could come up with was that these beings had magic themselves, or possibly something akin to it.

Arrayed before him were a slab of wood he had harvested from one of the smaller trees at the edge of the jungle and a muscle fibre from the heart of the larger of the two beasts. Unfortunately, he only had memories of a wand-crafter during the infancy of the art, who had not actually dealt in wands, but rather in larger staffs. Still, every little thing helped.

Harry carefully watched and learned as the master craftsman carefully formed hundreds of staffs for various clients, both young and old, with astounding clarity of vision and imagination. And as he followed what he had learned, the wood rose from the ground and seemed to liquefy, encasing the dried muscle in its midst. With all his power, just like he had learned, Harry pushed the image he had of his staff into every fibre of both his and the new staff’s being, until he slumped down exhaustedly, but incredibly happy.

The dark, wooden staff went to around his shoulder, completely free of any kind of ornament but the phoenix sitting at the top. It was, in a way, a memorial to the broken wand with Fawkes’ feather that he had left behind.

With an instinctive flourish, he brandished the staff; it was a good deal better than his wandless magic, as much was clear, but it could not hope to compete with his old wand, or even the one he had taken from Draco, or Hermione’s. Even so, it allowed him to comfortably raise a bit of an addition to his small shelter.

Now, a door might be considered small comfort, and a roof for his new, reptile, blue friend was all he needed at that point.


	3. Some Would Call it a Vacation

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: The Star Wars and Harry Potter copyrights lie with their respective owners, should any of them have any problem with my story being shared, I will comply with their wishes and remove it from circulation.  
> Please do not copy this work or any part of it.

Harry was not completely sure, how long he had been on the alien planet. Had he been forced to guess, he would have said less than a full, more than half a year. But that was the thing: For the first time in his entire life, no one was there to force him to do anything, and it was incredibly liberating. Sure, there were Ouroboros the snake and Rex the saurian that needed feeding, but they were his pets, so that was something he wanted to do. As for himself, when he was not out hunting, gathering or fishing to fill his new pantry (he had a pantry now) for when, if at all, winter came on this world and in the small valley where he had built his small house, he was silently sifting through the incredible amount of knowledge now crammed into his head.

Some of it was practical, like discerning the properties something would have when used in a potion, or how to train and domesticate animals, even though, for some reason, Rex had let him ride on his back ever since the day Harry had made his staff. Some of it was rather abstract, and not exactly something he could achieve while he was as isolated as he was; the creation of the Philosopher’s Stone, something he had indeed witnessed, was among these things. And then, there were the disturbing things, the most dramatic one being actually seeing the ritual he now thought Voldemort would have used to gain his misshapen baby body.

However, there was one other thing he noticed about these memories: many of the people in them looked somewhat familiar. Not hugely, or in any way that would jump at him immediately, but he found that, the younger the memories were, the closer to his own life, the more familiar the faces looked. There were his ears, his nose, his chin, even his hair and eyes. Never all of them together, obviously, but it was there. It led him to the conclusion that he had witnessed his ancestors, as well as his possible descendants; not all of them, mind you, but a good deal. It made him a bit sad to think that he had not seen one iota of his parents. Then again, they had been either young, in love and newlywed, or hiding from a madman. Neither of these were things he wanted to see all that much.

It was during one of the many sessions of memory-learning, Harry was studying ancient Roman sheep husbandry techniques, so nothing too weird, that a small whimper broke through the usually calm air of his new home. Immediately, his reflexes sharp from years of quidditch, a year on the run and his hermit existence on this planet, he was on his feet, staff ready in both hands at his side.

When nothing further happened, he forced his heart to beat a bit slower and crept his way toward where he thought the sound had come from. On the ground, not fifty metres from his house and past a small hilltop, he found a female human, or what he guessed was a human, dressed in what could only be described as tribal attire. Her hairs were done in intricate, if rather messy, braids, and she was wielding a staff not unlike his own. Her breathing was shallow, and Harry could immediately make out, what had happened. From the leg slowly creeping upward, most likely originating from two small puncture wounds, her muscles were stiff as a board, and her face was distorted in a grimace of pain.

Feeling incredibly lucky in having actually learned from a healer just a few days earlier, Harry immediately put the young woman, she could not be much older than he was, under a stasis spell. As he arose, floating his new patient behind him, he could just make out the back end of a green snake, the skin intersected by rings of red and yellow.

 **“Bitten by one of mine,”** Ouroboros confirmed, having come to join him in his investigation. **“Good as dead. Eat?”**

Harry valiantly suppressed a shudder; sometimes it was good to remember that especially the snake still very much was a wild animal. **“No eating humans!”** he ordered authoritatively, eliciting an annoyed hiss.

 **“Fine; you feed me well,”** the serpent commented, before slithering away into the trees; probably to hunt, Harry mused. He took the time the trip back to his home gave him to assess the mystery woman. She was rather tall, around his height, had dark-brown hair and steel-grey eyes, and the kind of body one could usually only expect from rigorous, varied training. She was not overly muscular, but her limbs were defined and strong. That was a good start, he was sure. While he had yet to see anything survive Ouroboro’s venom, a strong condition would aid her.

While he was loath to do so, it was still potion making, with or without Snape, Harry pulled his cauldron from under his workbench. Despite the greasy git’s best efforts to the contrary, he had finally learned some of the ‘subtle art’, and while he was currently not out to stopper death, he certainly hoped he would be able to stop it. Just as he was about to call for the little rascal, Ouroboros made his way into his workspace, nosy one that he was.

 **“Ouroboros, I need your venom,”** Harry told the snake, who quickly complied, leaving Harry with a small spatter of the now incredibly precious substance in a little, transfigured cup. Harry pulled out the compendium he had made, containing what he knew about the local flora and its properties, while over the carefully regulated heat of the blue fire, the very substance coursing through his charge’s veins, began the first steps toward the fabrication of an antidote.

By the time he finally finished, the wizard had been working for ten hours, with only small breaks for his ablutions and something to eat. Now, the only thing left to do was inject the acid-green concoction to counteract what was already in her blood. With a small bump of his staff, a small pebble was transfigured into an old-school human syringe, the silver metal and glass a striking contrast against the liquid inside. Given the nature of the cure, where exactly he injected the antivenin did not matter all that all that much, but Harry still did his best to actually hit the vein; it would aid in the distribution and shorten her suffering. With the complicated part behind him, all that was left was to wait.

OOOOOOOO

He awoke to the sound of an unknown female voice, speaking in a language he had never heard before. He was loath to do it, but now, there was little choice left, if he wanted to be able to communicate her. The odds of them speaking the same language were practically zero.

His staff in one hand and a mug out of hardened clay filled with water in the other, he returned to her bedside and let the frightened young woman drink up, before seeking the eye-contact he would need. Finally having an unimpeded view, he moved the staff he was using as a focus in her direction, barking out the incantation.

“Legilimens.”

If there was one thing easily learned from a memory, it was the mind arts, simply because they were just that, mind-based; they lacked a physical dimension. Even so, suddenly finding himself inside an alien mind, shaped by a completely distinct culture, was a dizzying experience. Harry did his best to stay only where he had a reason to be, around the parts that would teach him what he needed, but it was a hard piece of work, and a few pieces came through; a small girl, chasing after another along a fortified palisade; a young man taken away against the young woman’s will.

“Hello,” he introduced himself in what she knew as Galactic Basic; definitely some big implications to that name. Still, even with her knowledge of the language in his head, finding the words in the unorganised mess that was someone else’s comprehension was a task. It would pay to keep the conversation simple. “My name is Harry. I am not good with Basic, please speak slowly.”

The woman on his plain, single bed nodded fearfully. “I am Arden Tla, of the Frenzied River Clan,” she introduced herself timidly. “Where am I? What happened? I just remember the Kodashi viper…”

Harry simply nodded along with her; yes, Kodashi viper, that was the name of Ouroboros’ species. “You’d been bitten,” he informed his surprised patient. “The venom was already working its way through your body, but I managed to slow it down, until I had a cure ready. How does your leg feel?”

Shock would have been an apt description of the emotion her face now showed. “But no one survives being bitten,” she declared, shaking her head in denial, looking at him as if he had taken a bad potion himself. “They’re always dead before anyone can help.”

“Ah, yes.” Now he saw the problem. “I put you under… looking for a good word… a very strong sleeping spell, that slowed your body down, until could make the cure.”

“You use magic?” The shock she had shown beforehand was nothing compared to what she had to be feeling now. “I though the males could not use the spells.”

This brought a smile to Harry’s face; he was learning about an alien culture. Who would have thought? “Well, where I’m from, things are a bit different, it seems,” he commented diplomatically. “What were you doing out here, all alone?”

Arden fell silent for a while, and Harry thought he saw shame reflected on her face. When she started talking, it was so silent as to be almost impossible to hear. “I was banished for using a night spell,” she admitted, guilt shining profoundly on her young face. Whatever that crime was, it seemed to be a serious one for these people. “But I don’t want to join the Nightsisters, they’re cruel, and evil.”

“Hmm,” Harry commented unhelpfully. “Could you explain more? As I said, I am not from here.” Already, the words were coming to him more easily.

“She was taking my brother,” she suddenly broke down, crying, mounting a challenge greater than many he had faced before. Crying people, especially women, were hard for him. “He’s just eleven, I couldn’t let her take him as a mate.”

“Wait,” Harry interjected, even though he hated doing so, given Arden’s obvious distress. “Take as mate?”

“The adult women raid the other tribes to take the males as mates, of course,” she answered, again looking at him like he had gulped down a batch of bad potions. “That’s how it’s always been. But the Dreaming River Clan was hit with sickness, and they need new slaves, so they’ve started taking younger ones.”

A picture began forming in Harry’s head of the society he had found here, one he admittedly did not like that much. Gender-based dominion had always seemed rather arbitrary and unjust to him, not unlike the reverence of the purity of wizarding blood.

“And you objected, why?” he asked cagily. He still had to decide, whether he would trust this person, after all. “After all, it is the way of your people, right?”

She looked down shame-facedly. “I had hoped he would make his own choice one day,” she admitted. “I’ve been caring for him since mother died.” A sudden jolt ran through the woman and she looked at Harry fearfully. “You can’t stay here, she suddenly declared. “When the Dreaming River find you, and find out you can do magic, you’ll be in great danger.”

Harry groaned at the realisation that she was, indeed, correct in her assertion; a female-dominated society, where only the women could do magic, in need of a ‘population-boost’. Yes, they would certainly be interested in him, and he did not know, how many would be sent to confront him, or what kind of magic they controlled. At the moment, he cared little for his own future, but none of his plans included what sounded like forced servitude, maybe even slavery.

“Thank you for the warning,” he replied, solemnly looking at who he hoped might be an ally. “I will leave the planet as quickly as possible. Do you know, how I could do that?”

Arden seemed taken aback by that. “Only the Imperials have the means to do that, and they’re very careful. They fear Gethzerion escaping,” she explained, an unexpected gleam in her eyes.

“Well, they haven’t dealt with my magic yet,” Harry declared confidently, although he himself was not completely sure, how much of that confidence was real. One thing was sure however: Harry Potter would rather die than be made a slave.

“Imperials?” he remarked. “That couldn’t possibly be the people with the flying, grey bricks and whining black things, could they?”

OOOOOOOO

Only a day later, Harry had packed up all his meagre possession and stowed them in either his small bag, although it really only was a satchel on a thin string of hide, or his backpack. He had Rex saddled with the saddle he had adapted from one fitting a standard Earth horse, and completely demolished his now former house. However, there was one thing still left to deal with.

Arden was standing in the exact spot where she had slept during her recovery, the bed now completely gone. She was looking at him, conflict visible in her eyes; the woman was fighting with herself, as much was clear.

“Can I come with you?” she almost pleaded with him, hopefully locking eyes. “I can’t go back, I will die alone, and I never want to join the Nightsisters.”

He was moved by her anguish, he really was. Still, there was one thing that would exclude her from any kind of companionship with him.

“You can travel with me. Under one condition,” he allowed and let what he had said sink in a bit to make clear that this condition was indeed a deal-breaker. “I will not be your servant, nor will you be mine. If we can agree on that, there won’t be a problem.”

She nodded eagerly, an almost startling amount of joy on her face. It seemed like he was not the only one to dislike the way her society worked. His answer was a sharp nod, and she followed him to Rex. Watching as he climbed onto the large reptilian’s back, her eyes grew to what had to be the size of saucers.

“The Kwi lets you ride?” she asked, astonishment plainly audible. “That is a great honour, Harry.”

“Wouldn’t know,” Harry chuckled. “His name’s Rex. Come on, let’s go.”

Following the direction Arden had given him, and with Ouroboros around his shoulders, Rex began carrying them westward to the Imperial garrison.

“You know this one’s a female, right?”


	4. Take a Hike

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: The Star Wars and Harry Potter copyrights lie with their respective owners, should any of them have any problem with my story being shared, I will comply with their wishes and remove it from circulation.  
> Please do not copy this work or any part of it.

Regina, the newly renamed Kwi, turned out to be a persistent runner, even with two people on her back, and actually managed to carry the two of them for almost the entire day, and not at a shabby pace, too. Still, there came a point where the large reptile was simply exhausted, so Harry and Arden climbed down, rubbed their sore bums and took stock of their surroundings. They were at the foothills of a group of mountains, nothing too large, but still definitely the highest thing he had seen on the planet so far.

“We have to cross them,” Arden said, not exactly sounding happy about it, either. “From the top, we should already be able to see the Imperial prison complex. They sometimes never have their flying machines around, but sometimes one will come and drop off prisoners. That’s our only chance off the planet; everyone else, they like to shoot down. I’ve seen the explosions.”

Harry just nodded and took in the rocky rise they would have to climb the next day. “What planet are we on, exactly?” he suddenly asked, surprised as he was about not having done so before. “You’ve never mentioned, and I kind of just… appeared here.”

She looked at him questioningly, obviously not completely believing him. Nonetheless, she answered. “This is Dathomir,” she said. “I would not be able to tell you more, or how the galaxy sees us, I’ve never left the planet. But I can’t see how even the existence of us, or this planet would be advertised. I might not know much about the Empire, but even they won’t want to make an isolated prison-world all too public.”

A hum was the only thing she got in agreement. Even with his limited knowledge, this Empire smelled rather totalitarian to him, beyond just being called ‘The Empire’, in the first place. He had a distinct feeling that he would be at odds with those people sooner than he knew.

“I guess we’ll make camp, then,” Harry sighed, giving the rocky soil that would be tomorrow’s challenge a last, furtive look. Then, he proceeded to pull out the Potear-hide tent from his rucksack, once more thanking his instincts they had made him create this particular item. Or maybe it had been boredom?

In short order, what without magic would have been hard-pressed to house two people was assembled before them, carefully stuck to the ground, and magically expanded so the two of them would be able to keep a comfortable distance; nothing too far, given that the hide still resented any magic placed on it, but it would do for a while. They would not have to stay long, after all. So, under the both shocked and appreciative gaze of his companion, possibly even new friend, Harry led the way into their domicile for the night after making Regina was well taken care of.

After his long time in solitude, Harry had not planned on having any guests, so with little comment, he used his staff to transfigure a semi-comfortable bed. Feeling the conflicting urges of being a gentleman, and getting a good night’s sleep, he finally succumbed to his own moral compass and offered Arden the small cot.

Only minutes later, they were both lying in bed, harried by both worry and travel-induced exhaustion, but neither could really sleep. Harry had been turning around in his bed for he did not know how long, when he finally ended up looking directly at his companion over the warming, blue flames he had conjured. Unsurprisingly, she was looking right back and, judging from her expression, she had been looking at him for quite some time.

“I have never seen magic such as yours before,” the witch finally said, sounding rather unsure of herself, although why, Harry had no idea. “You never told me where you come from, or how you came to be here. There is something… something sad about you. You almost seem to be missing something.”

If nothing else, Harry now knew, why she had been unsure of herself; it was certainly a daring observation to make, considering how little they knew each other. Still, despite everything, her words somehow rang true.

“I have no idea, how I got here,” he finally admitted, after a long period of silence. “I don’t even know, how long I’ve been here. It’s not like I bothered to count days.”

She kept looking at him, almost through him, obviously not satisfied by his answer, yet unwilling to ask further.

“Might be a hundred days, half a year, a year,” Harry guessed. “No more than a year, but other than that, no idea. It was just… good, to be at peace.”

“Hmm,” Arden commented. “Peace; sounds like a good thing. Not something you’ll ever find on Dathomir, but a good thing, nonetheless. So, you have known war, unrest?”

Harry nodded. “Since I was way too young for someone to know such a thing,” he admitted. “The first time I killed someone, I was eleven. A mentor of mine told me he was already dead, but I know now that was not the case; I killed a man. Not something I regret, but neither something I enjoy.”

“Good,” Arden replied, a slight smile curving her lips. “It’s not something one should enjoy. Being triumphant, by all means, but for overcoming something, not for killing. Killing is just the unfortunate consequence. Not to be shied away from, but not celebrated either. Still, eleven? That’s not all that young.”

He was just about to reply in shock, when something he had learned in astronomy class came to the forefront of his mind. “Arden, how long does a year last on Dathomir?”

“491 rotations,” came the quick answer, immediately starting Harry on the calculations in his mind. It would explain her reaction to the age-thing, to a degree.

“Well, where I’m from, the year lasts 365 days,” Harry informer his companion. “So, in Dathomir years I would have been around seven or eight years old, I guess.”

With the age adjusted, Arden seemed a little more baffled by what he had told her. “How come?” she asked, visibly and audibly trying not to come off nosy. “It’s not something many at that age do.”

“Good deal of luck while defending myself,” he answered curtly. “Weird circumstances with the kind of magic my people use.”

Obviously noting his unwillingness to elaborate, the witch fell silent again, the only difference now being that she did not start talking again. Instead, she had fallen asleep.

OOOOOOOO

Awoken the next morning by the annoyingly effective buzzing sound of an alarm charm, Harry groaned, before cracking his joints and sitting up on the rough stone. Apparently, he had been more tired than he thought, evidenced by the fact that the bed he had created for himself had reverted some time during the night. At least, it had not woken him up, and the blankets had held longer and were still keeping him warm.

The next thing the wizard, now impeded by neck-pain, noticed, was the supremely amused expression of his travelling companion. Over on the camp-bed he had originally made for himself, Arden was watching him, clearly trying to hold in her laughter at his predicament.

“So, I suppose there is a time limit on your magic, no?” she remarked, surprisingly composed.

Following the halfway serious, halfway comedic glare he sent back, Harry replied, “If I just use my staff, definitely. With a real wand, or had I used runes, it would hold much longer. Being tired and unconcentrated doesn’t help either.”

She nodded, which he guessed was meant to communicate her understanding of what he had said. Without another word, the young wizard made his way for his bags, out of which he pulled a decent amount of food for them both. The amount of meat he had been eating was probably not the most nutritious of diets, but it would tide them over for the time being. If push came to shove, he still had a few nutrient potions he had managed to cobble together from local flora and wildlife.

Within minutes, the two of them were eating their drab meal of a few berries and foraged veggies, accompanied by a good deal of dried meat Harry could not even remember which animal it came from. When wishing for a simpler life during the first 17 or 18 years of his decidedly more complicated one, he had hardly imagined this; it was in a way simpler, though.

A wave of his staff soon had the tent packed up, before the small bundle quickly vanished into his backpack. He was just about to try and mount Regina, but before he could, the large blue reptile looked at him almost… sadly? As if trying to tell him something, or maybe it was actually doing exactly that, the animal that had become somewhat of a friend, looked at the rocky soil they would be traversing all through the day, shook its head, and looked back at Harry.

“That’s okay,” the wizard assured the remarkably intelligent creature. “Thanks for taking us this far.”

With one last nudge of the square snout, strong enough to almost make Harry topple over, the creature turned around ran back toward the savanna where the two of them had first met. From Arden’s reaction to Regina, or Rex at the time, it had been an honour to only be accompanied by the large saurian-like creature, so he vowed not to be too broken up about it. Still, a lingering sense of loneliness remained.

The now diminished group consisting of a young wizard, a Dathomirian witch and a snake began their climb shortly thereafter, their goal being to reach the top before noon, if at all possible. Words were rarely heard during their hike, and it was this silence that allowed Harry to reflect on himself a bit more, a process that had probably been started by Arden’s questions the evening before.

He would be the first to admit to being a bit disconcerted about his reaction to basically losing everything he had ever known. And while no one would begrudge him his feelings of generally not caring about leaving behind the wizarding world itself, because really, how much would he be missing it? He certainly would not miss being hailed for things he simply did want to be hailed for, and Voldemort’s death would have made the whole thing even worse. Or being publicly vilified. However, there had been a few people he had the feeling he _should_ be missing; not Ron, necessarily, someone he still did not know how he felt about, after all the shit he had pulled over the years. But Hermione? He should certainly be missing Hermione, should he not? And Ginny? Mrs. Weasley?

Over his ever-circling thoughts, the march up the mountain, calling it a hike seemed, in hindsight, a bit overinflated, seemed to both fly by and drag on. Still, in the end, he had no idea where time had gone, when they reached the top of the highest peak. While aware that he should probably have joined Arden in taking a light meal, Harry instead sat down on a patch of dry grass and let himself clam down, breathing deeply, like he did whenever he tried remembering some of the things he had witnessed during… whatever it had been that had deposited him on this planet, in this time. And as he let himself sink deeper into what could probably be considered a meditation exercise, he was struck by a weird instinct.

Guided by an almost irresistible urge, he rose out of his seated position, and began following the ridge, the middle point of which they had made their rest stop. Harry was now following that ridge to its higher northern end, where it grew both rockier as well as narrower. At the very tip, with deep drops in all but one direction, there was a small, almost processed looking piece of stone, on top of which, barely visible, lay a small, almost invisible crystal.

Just before touching the mystery crystal, Harry stayed his hand; things calling out to you would certainly make the list of things Arthur Weasley would warn his children of, along things that could think while having no visible part where they could keep their thoughts. Despite his misgivings, all the spells he had in his repertoire to reveal harmful intent came back negative. Mollified that he would not go up in flames, or anything the likes of which, the young wizard followed his earlier instinct and bowed down to pick up the mysterious crystal.

The moment he touched the surface, a feeling flooded him that he could only correlate to one other: how it had felt to take his holly and phoenix feather wand in his hand for the first time. Not quite as intense, maybe, but then again, it was only a piece of crystal, one part of a whole, and in that moment, Harry knew he had found a core for his new staff, or wand, or whatever it would turn out to be in the end.

OOOOOOOO

“There, that landing pad is our only way off the planet,” Arden explained, pointing toward the raised metal structure in drab grey. “Doesn’t seem like they have a ship there at the moment,” she added, a hint of annoyance tinting her voice.

“Makes sense,” Harry thought out loud. “If they’re worried about someone leaving the planet, they won’t be leaving any ships just standing around. Wouldn’t do us any good, anyway.” Seeing the questioning glance, he was receiving from the witch sitting next to him in the underbrush around the Imperial garrison/prison, he added, “I don’t know how to fly a starship. Do you?”

“fair point,” she admitted, before turning her attention back to the occupational forces that had invaded her home. “So, what do we do?”

Harry had been thinking about that for quite a while; he might have been able to assimilate the knowledge from some unlucky Imperial, running around the base, but he would rather not. Ethical questions aside, he had by now simply decided not to snoop into people’s personal lives, what he had gained from entering Arden’s mind to learn her language had been purely theoretical. Theory was not something he was willing to base his escape, and the survival of his new friend on. That was especially true when it concerned flying a starship.

“Well, I’m guessing,” he led into an explanation of his plan, but was rudely interrupted before he could say any more.

“Hands up, civilians aren’t allowed around the Imperial Complex,” barked a harsh male voice from behind. “Turn around, slowly.”

They had been cornered by a group of nine soldiers, dressed in plain green-grey jumpsuits, levelling some kind of gun at them. The leader, who Harry presumed had spoken to them. They all wore breastplates and helmets and seemed hardly older than either of the two people they were holding at gunpoint.

It was a good deal of work to overcome the sudden sense of panic flooding him, but soon Harry became aware that he could use the situation to his advantage. They would always have had to find someone they could milk for information, a situation which had now remedied itself quite nicely. Thanking his unusually lucky star for having learned _that_ particular spell the young wizard grinned internally, before turning to Arden.

“Terribly sorry,” he said, an apologetic smirk on his lips.

She smiled back at him, a genuine smile, albeit tinged with sadness. “Not your fault this happened.”

“Oh, not that…” Harry replied dismissively. “This. STUPEFY MAGNUS!”

The last bit had been roared, accompanied by a hard impact from his staff into the ground, from which a wave of red energy went outward, incapacitating everyone it touched, namely eight soldiers and one Dathomirian witch.

Just to ensure no one would wake up before their time, he went around and stunned each one again, individually, before he kneeled down and revived Arden.

“Oh, my head,” she complained as she sat up, intently rubbing her temples.

Harry chuckled. “And that’s what I was sorry for.”

She looked around the small clearing at the edge of which they had been caught, inspected each of the soldiers individually, and turned back around to look at him. “I think I can accept a bit of discomfort when it means not being a prisoner,” she said earnestly. “What do we do with these? Kill them? Believe me, they would not hesitate to do the same.”

He shook his head. “Look at them, they’re barely older than us, and I don’t think they would actually just murder prisoners,” the wizard replied, looking at his companion harshly. “Besides, if we kill them, we might elicit some kind of response that we definitely don’t want. I’ll look into their minds for some information, then alter their memories.”

It was plainly visible that Arden felt a burning need to question him on what he had said, but obviously managed to keep her curiosity in check, something Harry was intensely thankful for. So, instead of answering a slew of questions, he immersed himself in the memories from which he had initially learned the mind arts, unwilling as he was to permanently harm who were basically just young people around his age.

With a steeling breath, he arose, strode over to the leader of the patrol that had found them, went down on one knee, and hit him with a reviving spell. The man fought against his binds for a bit, all the while looking fearfully at Harry. Trying to block out his feeling of guilt at intruding the soldier’s mind, the wizard sought eye-contact and, as soon as it was established, he intoned, “Legilimens.”

What he found in the sergeant’s mind, for that was his rank, as it turned out, supported nearly all of his earlier assumptions. While the man himself, as the squad leader, had a bit more experience, he was dissatisfied with his squad, made up of fresh recruits from all over the Empire, reasonably professional, but with no real interest in serving the Army. Not one of them was happy to be stationed on Dathomir, which they considered a dead-end posting if there ever was one, an assessment Harry found himself agreeing with as soon as he started learning more.

After a few minutes of careful search, mindful as he was of neither causing undue pain nor peeking at anything too private, Harry withdrew from the sergeant’s mind, before quickly re-stunning him.

“We’re lucky,” he relayed his findings. “They get supplies and new prisoners once a month, that’s in three days. Otherwise, no one lands on or leaves the planet without being shot at by something called a _Victory_ that’s guarding the planet. Otherwise, these are just conscripts wishing to be anywhere else _but_ here. Now tell me, what kind of local wildlife would be attacking a patrol like this, and how would that look?”

OOOOOOOO

“I’ve laid a few basic wards, so don’t leave the clearing. You won’t find back,” Harry warned his companion, as they watched the small Imperial patrol trudge away in their tattered uniforms, a good few bruises adorning their bodies, while three of them had ‘lost’ their weapons and some gear in a stampede of large, local herbivores.

With nary a further commentary, Harry erected the tent and sat himself down in front of his small workspace, laying out the guns in front of him. From the trooper’s memories he knew how to operate and service the weapons, but given that he had some time available, he wanted to actually go through the motions at least a few times. Also, having taken one more than they needed to arm themselves, he would be taking a look at the surplus gun in an effort to find out, how well this kind of technology worked in conjunction with his magic.

Therefore, while Arden was practicing her melee proficiency on the patch of grass in front of the tent, he was now inspecting an E-11 blaster rifle, standard armament for the Imperial army. From a design standpoint the whole thing was rather simple; it had a grip, a barrel, a hole one should take care to point at the enemy and not one’s own foot. Basic muggle firearm, in essence.

Still, the technology of these weapons was way beyond anything the muggles had ever developed on Earth, and at the moment, it was way beyond Harry’s understanding, as well. The man he had read had been a basic grunt, after all, not someone overly interested in how exactly the weapon he used worked. Oh, he had a rudimentary understanding, for sure, enough to clear any malfunctions, but not to the extent that Harry would require to try anything too complicated with the weapon.

Resigning himself to the fact that, for the time being, experimentation with this fascinating technology would be limited, Harry proceeded to practice dis- and reassembling the blaster faster and faster, until he was satisfied he would probably be able to do it from muscle memory, without going through the time-intensive process of accessing someone else’s memory. Satisfied with his own proficiency, he decided that the next thing he would do would be to test his own proficiency against such a gun.

To this end, he transfigured a number of stone slabs, which he arranged to be a kind of chamber, leaving a hole just large enough to push the barrel through. He then applied a basic shield charm to the back of the chamber and fired.

One. Two. Three. Four. Five. Six. Seven.

On the seventh shot, he felt the shield buckle, on the ninth it failed spectacularly.

 _“So, I better not get caught in the crossfire,”_ he mused. _“Still, better than nothing.”_

“Hey, what are you doing?” a severely sweaty Arden asked from behind him, looking over his shoulder at the contraption he had constructed. “Still testing the Imperials’ weapons?”

“Hmm,” Harry nodded as an affirmation. “I’d like to keep a low profile, and that’s not going to happen if I start throwing around spells. I was just looking at how those guns worked to see if I could upgrade them. I have a few ideas, I just don’t know, whether they’ll tolerate my magic. Technology from my home usually did not.”

“Can you show me?” she asked, looking at the weapons in fascination. “I’m not sure I like using them but throwing away the advantage would be stupid.”

Over the next hour, Harry went through maintenance and handling of the rifles with Arden, showing her the same drills he, himself had drawn from the sergeant’s memories. She turned out to be a quick study, and shortly, she was almost as quick at it as he was. Given that he had double the experience she did, how ever little difference that made in absolute numbers, Harry was impressed. So, within short order, he was back to his original inquiry; how well did these blasters tolerate magic?

Given that his stated goal was being sneaky, he decided the first thing he would try would be to silence the uncomfortably loud weapon, something that was already easier said than done. From what little he knew about Earth’s muggle firearms, and it was not all that much, given that he had never looked for any kind of gunmaker in his memories, he knew that they had two reasons to be loud; the first was the explosion of the propellant, something he would not have to worry about with blasters.

However, it was the second thing that made blaster operation loud, and it was the displacement of air around the particle beam, something much harder to silence than a ‘simple’ explosion, and even harder to eliminate, given the central position it held in this technology. Frankly, Harry had been surprised how knowledgeable the sergeant was about the topic, especially with his general ignorance concerning the finer points of how the beam came to be. Still, he supposed it would make sense for the Empire to make sure their soldiers were aware of their weapons’ capabilities.

Resigning himself to return to the silencing issue at a later time, he turned his attention to a different problem, namely the sergeant’s general state of annoyance with overheating weapons. Now that was a problem he could easily remedy within minutes. The runic equivalent of a cooling charm was applied shortly to the underside of the barrel where he was sure the enchantment would also incorporate the cooling coils.

Under the watchful eyes of his travelling companion, and with the safety firmly activated, Harry carried the gun outside, where he placed it on one of the stone slabs he had used earlier. In short order, the small testing chamber was rebuilt, only outside, and covered with both a silencing charm and a shield, the blaster itself levitating at the opening. Already pressing his eyes closed, the wizard pulled on the string he had attached to the trigger mechanism and… nothing happened.

Not that much, at least.

When he opened his eyes, it became clear that the blaster had indeed fired a shot, but nothing more; a favourable outcome if there ever was one. Just to make sure it had not been an accident, or simply blind luck, he fired again, and again, and again until the power pack ran out. Still, nothing had blown up. Satisfied with his success, Harry dispelled the protections he had erected, only to extend the silencing charm onto the whole clearing. Within short order, the cooling enchantment was applied to the two other weapons, and both he and Arden were shooting at two conjured bullseyes, both dearly hoping they would not need that training.


	5. Utilitarian Opulence

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: The Star Wars and Harry Potter copyrights lie with their respective owners, should any of them have any problem with my story being shared, I will comply with their wishes and remove it from circulation.  
> Please do not copy this work or any part of it.

“Finally, I was really getting sick of this place,” Arden commented, as she and Harry were watching the grey ship approach the landing pad, looking to be exactly the same class the wizard had seen way back when he had first appeared on Dathomir. The brick-like ship was even accompanied by the same whiney sounding escorts as before.

“Well, now or never,” he declared, while already raising his staff, which he proceeded to lightly knock onto his companion’s head.

“Ow, what was that for?” the witch complained, either not noticing or not caring about the weird sensation that was probably running down her skin at that moment.

Harry glared at her a little, unsure of whether her complaint was a jest or actually a serious one. “I told you, it helps you blend in, so to speak. Won’t allow you to run around in the open, I’m not strong enough for that, but it keeps you reasonably well hidden. Now, take up the line so I can disillusion myself, too.”

Without further comment, Arden picked up the small string Harry had made for them to be able to keep close to each other, even while disillusioned. Satisfied that they would not lose each other, he applied the very same charm to himself, before silencing them both. They reached the landing platform without interference, only having to sneak past a few definitely bored and mostly inattentive guards.

From close by, Harry marvelled at the actual size of the craft they were hoping to stow away on. By his estimate, the ship had to be more than 30, if not 40 metres long, and at the very least half as wide. They had arrived the moment the troopers were starting to unload their cargo, an impressive number of standardised boxes on hovering sleds, and it took the dozen people assigned to the task a few minutes to complete. That was the moment he had been waiting for. With a small tug on the string Arden held the other end of, he signalled his intention, and quickly snuck along the loading ramp at the side of the craft, before anyone could get any ideas about coming back.

The interior of the craft was just as drab as the exterior had been: grey metal walls, stark floors, no furnishings. He was just lucky he had let his snake go free the day before, not willing to take a wild animal onto a journey that might take them weeks, inside an environment that was definitely not reptile-friendly. To the fore of the vehicle, they found a rather cramped cockpit, and a small bathroom, if one could even call it that. Before they had the time to explore more, not that there was a lot to explore, they heard a number of voices coming from the back of the craft.

In what Harry guessed was the cargo hold, a group of people had arrived, consisting of two men in black uniforms, two of the army troopers they had seen before and three, two men and one woman, in what looked like prisoners’ uniforms.

“Yeah, so tell me again why our shuttle is being used to transfer prisoners? This is a landing craft, not a prison transport,” the older of the black-uniformed men grumbled roughly.

The army troopers frowned, almost in unison. “Well, feel free to tell that to Tarkin yourself; I’m just following orders,” one of the soldiers answered, intensifying the annoyed look on the shuttle captain’s face.

“Tarkin? This is not even his sector,” he replied belligerently.

“Look, I’m not happy with this, you’re not happy with this, but it’s not like we have much choice,” the more reasonable seaming of the two countered. “I’ve brough cots for everyone, so we have somewhere to sleep, at least. Let’s get going and this over with. You three,” he barked at the prisoners, “assemble these. And they better be perfect when I inspect them, or else…”

With that, the older, and grumpier, of the two troopers threw an armful of folded constructs at the least emaciated prisoner, who just barely managed to catch the heavy-looking items. “And be careful with your filth, traitor. These better be spotless, when I inspect them later,” he barked at the three; he reminded him a bit of an older, more pudgy, brunette version of Draco Malfoy. Rather sure of himself because of who stood behind him, not because of anything he had actually done by himself.

However, if there was one thing Harry had to admit he respected about these people, it was their efficiency. Within minutes, partitioning had been set, cordoning off part of the room. Not the part where the prisoners would sleep, naturally, but the Imperials’ cots. For his and Arden’s lodgings, Harry simply warded one corner of the large cargo compartment all the way to the other end of the galaxy, before setting up the tent. While being cooped up in there for days on end would certainly not be considered anything approaching fun, looking at the orange-clad people assembling the cots immediately put things into perspective.

OOOOOOOO

Over the following days, Harry and Arden spent a large amount of time just sitting either inside the tent or outside at the tent flap. Neither did they talk much, as, despite being sure in their protections, it still did not feel safe, in a way. What they did get to do a lot of, though, was simply listen, and even just doing that, they learned a lot.

The first, and possibly most important observation, from a strategic point of view, was the obvious antipathy between the two groups of soldiers assigned to the duty of transporting both the prisoners and, unwittingly, the two stowaways. It was never really overt, how much they disliked each other, but over the three days the ship’s chronometer showed they had now been travelling, it could not have been clearer.

The Imperial Army and the Imperial Navy parts of the crew hated each other, and the only redeeming factor they could see in their respective ‘comrades in arms’ was the fact that neither of them were something they called Stormtroopers. While Harry could understand the disposition of the army members, they had most likely been ‘sharply encouraged’ to join up, after all, he did not really understand what the two pilots were on about. Both of them seemed to have the instincts and bearing of career officers, not someone who had been pressed into service.

Eventually, he resigned himself to the assumption that they probably had some reason for their bitterness, as well. Flying a glorified space-lorry would, after the novelty of spaceflight wore off, probably not place high on his list of priorities, either.

Now the prisoners, on the other hand, were a lot more interesting. On the second day of their voyage, he happened to overhear the three chained captives talking, as one of their guards (the other was sleeping, allowing for round-the-clock surveillance) had gone to the restroom.

“What do you think Tarkin wants with us?” one of the men, Harry had, for obvious reasons, taken to calling him ‘Beard’, asked the others. “And, if it’s just more interrogations, why not let the people at the prison handle it. He made himself a lot of enemies over the years, so getting someone to drop us off can’t have been as easy as calling in a favour.”

The sole woman with them, Harry called her ‘Bangs’, just shrugged, while the other man, ‘Baldy’, began talking, only to be quickly cut off by ‘Beard’. “What if he wants to know about…”

“Shut up!” the other man hissed. “Do you know how many microphones Imperial Intelligence has all over this place? No? Well, neither do I, so don’t say anything even remotely interesting. Those two guarding us might have all the wits of a grazer, but whoever gets to listen to those recordings will certainly be a lot smarter.”

The whole conversation worried Harry, quite a bit actually. He did not think there were actually recording devices hidden throughout the room, and if there were, what skills he had pulled from one of his possible descendant’s memories, a technomage by profession, had taken care of whatever might have been in place. Still the underhandedness and general state of what he had seen before told him he would not like what he found in the greater galaxy. So much for peacefully making the best of… whatever had happened to him.

Hearing the scrape of boots on metal, the three quickly fell silent again, greeting the returning trooper with what Harry was now sure were fake deferential looks. The conscript, however, seemed to be content with the fear and fealty he must have assumed he inspired in the prisoners. It made sense, from a certain standpoint; being left little choice, whether to enlist or not, probably did not elicit a great feeling of self-worth and control. Then again, he well remembered something Sirius had once said. “If you want to know what a man’s like, take a good look at how he treats his inferiors, not his equals.” Given the way his godfather had proceeded to treat Kreacher, the irony was not lost on Harry. Still, that irony did not detract from the wisdom of his godfather’s observation. And the way this soldier was treating those beneath him did not speak highly of his character.

Completely convinced that he would not be hearing any more interesting information, Harry got onto his two feet and entered the enchanted tent, assured as he was after two days that the wards would hold of any attempted incursion into his and Arden’s sanctuary. As far as travelling as a stowaway went, it was really not half bad.

His travelling companion was lazily lounging around on the cot she had been occupying ever since they had started their journey, gently throwing her staff from one hand to the other with a bored expression on her face. Seeing her with the long piece of wood, an idea came to Harry.

“Arden,” addressed the witch. “Would you like to try, whether you can do my kind of magic? Might be interesting to know.” For a while, the witch looked at him funnily, almost as if the idea was completely foreign to her mind. Which, now that he had heard a little bit about the society she had been raised in, seemed reasonable to assume. After all, the witches of Dathomir were often only able to produce the effects of some part of their Allyan magic; whether that was a true limitation, or one put in place by being brought up in culture that believed that limitation to be there naturally, Harry did not know. Still, it could not hurt to try.

“I suppose,” she responded almost shily, like she did not completely believe he was willing to share this with her. Seeing he did not waver in his conviction, Arden became firmer in her resolve. “Yes, I would like that… but no shadow magic, alright?”

Harry nodded; he had no great interest to show her that, anyway. Sure, he might have had a new understanding of the Killing Curse, but that did not mean that some of the other magic wizards had come up with over the eons was not truly vile. He felt ill just thinking of some of the stuff he had read during his, admittedly rare, looks into the various books Hermione had brought on their hunt for the horcruxes. No, compared to most of the stuff, a quick, _painless_ death was infinitely preferable. There were, after all, worse things in life than death.

“No shadow magic,” the young wizard assured his friend. “In fact, as soon as I have a proper focus, maybe with that crystal I found on the mountain, I’ll show you the lightest bit of magic I know. It’s sort of a… protector spirit, I guess. Not a real spirit, more an embodiment of happiness and all that is good, really. Even just being in the presence of a strong one makes you ridiculously happy.”

He thought back to the first time he had produced a patronus, back at home. It was still a weird feeling, thinking of his old life and not really feeling anything about it. Yes, he was starting to miss Hermione, actually more than Ron, now that he was thinking about it, but that old life had always been hard and painful, and while it was probable that, with Voldemort being dead (at least that much he was certain of, if nothing else), things would have become easier had he stayed, he was now getting a blank slate, so to speak. There was definitely something to be said for that.

Noticing the time that had passed since he had ended his last sentence, Harry pushed on. “If we find out this is something you can do, we’ll have to make you a wand or staff as well. Mine should work, for now, but it’s always better to have your own.” With that explanation out of the way, the wizard handed over his staff, feeling oddly naked not having the smooth piece of wood at his immediate disposal.

“Most wizards use wands, but I lacked the skill to craft something as delicate,” he explained, a little amused by the awestruck expression on Arden’s face. At the very least, she seemed to be feeling some sort of connection to the focus, crude as the tools might have been. “Now, it’s kind of grown on me. I always had the feeling a wizard should have a staff, you know.” When his pronouncement was met with a questioning look reinforced by a raised eyebrow, he chuckled. “I suppose you don’t.”

The entirety of pop-culture being forgotten obviously had the advantage of nobody knowing about _the_ Harry Potter, either. That in mind, the very same Harry Potter counted the whole thing as a victory. And, he now had the opportunity to try something he never had been able to before; teach someone magic who had not been influenced by the wizarding world. He was definitely looking forward to it.

“We’re going to be starting with something rather easy,” he told the now eagerly watching witch. “It’s the levitation charm, the incantation is ‘Wingardium Leviosa’. It’s important to be clear in your pronunciation. Just point the staff at whatever you want to use it on.”

Arden nodded, gripped the staff more tightly and concentrated intently on the piece of dried meat Harry had laid out for her to practice on. “Wingardium Leviosa,” she ordered the magic, so fierce in her delivery that her tutor almost expected to see the meat float between them. Alas, having never used a focus like this before, and attempting a new spell, she had little chance to achieve what she had set out to do.

“Good first try,” Harry commended her, wiping away the slightly put-out expression that had appeared on her face. “When you pronounce this spell…”

They kept practising for hours after that, Harry sliding back into the ‘teacher role’ he had enjoyed so very much during the days of the DA, and soon, Arden did not only know the levitation charm, but could also magically open doors and stun people. Not all that much, but definitely more than either of them had ever expected in so short a time.

OOOOOOOO

After they had spent almost four whole days on the small shuttle, at least according to the clock one of the troopers had brought, they seemed to reach wherever they had been headed to. At least, that was how Harry interpreted that suddenly, the normal shifts for guarding and piloting were dissolved, while the prisoners were ‘gently encouraged’ to deconstruct their cots. The whole thing was painful to watch, but after his year on the run, hunting horcruxes, having a bigger goal while ignoring things he could do nothing about had somehow become common practice. Still, it irked, tingling Harry’s saving-people-thing.

In any way, around twenty minutes after the prisoners had been given their task, a small shudder went through the craft, startling all those arrayed in the cargo hold, including Harry and Arden, who were sitting and waiting where their tent had once stood. With a hiss and an inordinate amount of white steam he could hardly believe was really necessary, the door that had been closed since the very beginning of their journey opened, revealing what Harry could only describe as a gigantic hangar.

Guessing the size to the best of his ability, he assumed one would be able to stack several Privet Drive 4s both next to and on top of each other. Yet, despite the enormous amount of space available that could probably put to use, the only thing he could see behind the boarding ramp was an enormous expanse of polished, black floor. When the tired and annoyed legitimate occupants had finally left their shuttle, it was time for Harry and Arden to sneak out. Employing the same trick as when they had snuck onboard, they both grabbed a piece of string, before the young wizard placed them both under disillusionment charms.

As they set foot on the hangar floor, Harry took a moment to look around, taking in the scenery. Despite his earlier impression, there actually was quite a bit going on. Not to the extent he would have expected for a space this big, but still. There were gantries and scaffolding lining the walls, one of them now moving toward the vessel they had arrived in, the people moving around it seemingly intent on servicing the craft. Toward the back of the room, if room was even an appropriate name for something this size, were multiple doors, guarded by men in black tunics with weird, oversized helmets. Somehow, the place managed to convey both a certain utilitarianism, as well as a stifling opulence.

Seeing the maintenance crew come closer, Harry tugged on the string, leading Arden away from where he expected the mechanics would soon be crowding (after all, he could still be very much bumped into, even disillusioned), and stepped toward the large sliding doors at the back of the hangar. Already feeling bad about doing so again, he stepped up in front of one of the guards, made eye-contact with the man, even though the soldier did not know that, even with the rather limited cover of a disillusionment charm, and let loose his legilimency.

He struggled for a few moments, as did the guard, with keeping on his knees, but soon righted himself and absorbed what he had learned. Even the idea of an artificial object containing hundreds of these hangars was astounding. Then again, a diameter of over a hundred kilometres and the capability to destroy a planet seemed equally as ludicrous. For now, Harry filed it under possibilities; this Empire did not seem like it was above propaganda to fool both the citizens and the common soldiery.

However, another thing that he had learned, and that was of more immediate, practical use, was a part of the installation’s layout: specifically, where to find the barracks. And that was where he led Arden. The rooms the scores of people keeping everything running inhabited were strictly segregated between the different branches of the military. Given the general dislike between these people, Harry was not all that surprised.

Their target in mind, a quarter for officers belonging to the Navy complement, Harry snuck around a multitude of corridors (it was a big installation, alright), until they reached something he really had not been expecting to find in this place: they were standing in a park. Not all that pretty, admittedly, rather sterile in its design, but still, a park. There was even a news kiosk, although he was quite sure the only thing you could buy from it was heavily ‘edited’ by the relevant authorities.

Across the small plaza was what they wanted to reach, and what the guard had been thinking about with enormous jealousy; the quarters of some of the higher officers. Not the elite, by far, but important enough to warrant personal rooms. Thankfully, time on the station seemed to be set so that it was not currently breaktime for any personnel. Or possibly, there simply were not that many people allowed to use this particular area; either way, there were only five people there, all of them gathered around a high table drinking something looking and smelling a lot like coffee.

Without losing any time, Harry pulled Arden along the circumference of the small park, listening to the group of grey-clothed officials with broad bars of coloured squares in yellow, red and blue.

“…gives me the creeps,” the youngest of the men complained, prompting his older companions to scowl at him darkly, all the while subtly distancing themselves from their big-mouthed comrade. “The only one with any control over him is Tarkin, and that doesn’t really make me feel better.”

The oldest of the group, a white-haired man with five of the rank-squares on his chest, all of them blue, turned his beady eyes on his younger colleague, and declared pompously, “Lord Vader is the most powerful force in the fight to defend the New Order.”

After that, even though talk of this Lord Vader sounded interesting, having only gotten a vague idea from the people whose minds he had read, the pair of infiltrators resumed their walk toward the door, the remaining walk only another 50 or so metres.

Then, in typical Harry fashion, things went terribly wrong. Within seconds, what had been a fairly empty space was filled with white-armoured stormtroopers, E-11s at the ready and pointing at the group of (mostly) surprised officers. In the midst of the throng of armoured personnel was one that stood out. A rather old looking man with white hair, just like the oldest of the officers, and an impressive, equally white moustache, was at the back of the formation, his white uniform a contrast to both the stormtroopers as well as the grey-clothed officers.

“Colonel Yularen,” the navy officers snapped to attention. All of them, but one; during the commotion, the oldest one, the one with the five blue rank-squares, had been steadily trying to make his way to the only door that was not covered by a horde of obviously well-trained troopers.

“At ease,” the newcomer, obviously Colonel Yularen, told the still saluting group, even though his eyes were firmly fixed on the only member of their group who was not saluting. “Leaving us so soon, Captain Mody?”

What had formerly been a cautious creeping turned to a full-on sprint, as the target of Yularen’s attention desperately made for the unguarded door.

“Restrain him,” the colonel ordered his soldiers, and with astonishing precision, only two of them triggered a stun pulse, both of them hitting the fleeing captain square in the back, causing his legs to give out mid-step. With a sickening crunch and a splatter of blood from his ruined nose, he landed on the decking under the wide-eyed stares of his, now former, comrades and the trained indifference of the Empire’s enforcers.

“Take him to cell-block AA-22,” Yularen, who Harry was starting to think more and more of as some kind of secret police, ordered, quite loudly. Having been goaded into his fair share of traps, it was rather obvious, what the plan here was. Nevertheless, just from the look on the face of the youngest member of that group of officers, Harry was sure it was not only rather blatant, but also dangerously effective.

When the troops were finally gone, and the remaining officers had returned to the business of sipping from their cups, which were now generously topped up with some form of alcoholic beverage, Harry pulled on the string linking him and Arden. Together, they made their way to a new, now quite specific target.

It did not take them long to reach Captain Mody’s quarters, suitably ransacked, as he would have expected from a thorough fascist government, where Harry could finally drop his disillusionment charms on them both. That was, of course, _after_ doing to the cameras hidden in the room what he had already done to the ones hidden in the shuttle on which they had hitched a ride.

Now that he could finally see her again, Arden looked just as stunned as he felt at what they had witnessed on their small tour of the facilities; the sheer scale of the space station was astonishing, having forced them to go for minutes without ever turning a corner along straight corridors. That was without even mentioning the presence of a literal park in the middle of all that sterile metal.

“We have to help that guy,” Harry finally declared. But not before taking a few deep breaths and trying to let everything he had seen, both with his own eyes and inside someone else’s mind, sink in. “That Yularen guy definitely made it too easy to find the Captain, and the young one seemed way too eager to take the bait.”

Arden looked at him questioningly. “I agree with your observations,” she finally commented. “But not with your conclusion. Did you see how good those… stormtroopers you said they were called?” Harry nodded. “How good those stormtroopers were? And that Yularen guy is no idiot, either. I don’t see, how us getting caught is going to help anyone.”

Harry mulled it over in his head, and he had to agree. Partly, at the very least, even though his ‘saving people thing’ was screaming inside him to just grab a ship and run. Then, another unfortunate thought popped in his head.

“We’re going to need someone, who can fly whatever we take out of here,” he muttered unhappily. “I could simply use what I learned from someone else’s memories, but with everything I’ve learned that way, I’ve had to practice with my own two hands. I’d rather not do that practising while someone is shooting at us…”

His companion swore a bit under her breath, before acquiescing to his assessment with a nod. “I don’t know how to fly a ship, either,” she admitted. “So, what’s the plan?”

A small smile on his lips, Harry laid out his ideas. After all, he had done something very similar before, what now seemed like a lifetime ago.


	6. Trash Compactors are for Amateurs

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: The Star Wars and Harry Potter copyrights lie with their respective owners, should any of them have any problem with my story being shared, I will comply with their wishes and remove it from circulation.  
> Please do not copy this work or any part of it.

Harry and Arden, freshly decked out in some of Captain Mody’s uniforms the wizard had transfigured to fit both their bodies, as well as Yularen’s colour scheme, walked briskly along the corridors. The personnel they passed would, without exception, throw them looks of either fear, disgust or both. However, just as planned and expected, it also kept anyone from interfering in what the crew assumed was very important, extremely secretive business. In fact, their uniforms invoked enough terror in everyone they passed that nobody questioned their… unusual gear.

They were both wearing duplicates of Mody’s rang insignia and even his code cylinders (as Harry had learned they were called from the guard whose mind he had invaded), even though these were purely cosmetic and had been transfigured from two pairs of spare socks.

However, despite the confident pose they adopted, there was one major problem with an otherwise excellent plan; neither of them knew where to find detention block AA-23, let alone the man they were hoping to rescue from inside the block. Despite his general reluctance to do so, Harry had been prepared to take the information out of some unlucky security guard’s mind. However, the fear and disdain people seemed to have for the men and women in white extended to a reluctance to look them in the eyes. Unfortunately, looking into the target’s eyes was vital to a successful legilimency attack.

This conundrum had led to Arden and Harry wandering around rather aimlessly, until they stumbled upon a small mess-hall, filled to the brim with benches and tables. It looked like the kind of place one would find the lower ranks, but the young wizard’s grumbling stomach cared little for that distinction. Having no other viable plan, the two of them placed themselves in front of the counter, prompting some very nervous looks from the woman behind it. Nevertheless, they were served two slabs of rather colourless meat and some vegetables that had obviously been deemed unworthy of being served to the officers.

With some trepidation, the servicewoman handed over the two meals. Harry really wanted to smile at her, set her at ease a bit, but he pushed that instinct down. Sure, she was a bit uncomfortable, but if he and Arden were found out, the consequences for them would probably be more than just a bit uncomfortable, and definitely longer lasting than the momentary discomfort the crewwoman was currently feeling.

Still, intent on not prolonging her suffering, he quickly slid onto one of the benches, opposite of Arden, and began eating. The food tasted just as bland as it looked, but Harry was hungry enough to mow it down like a wolf, anyway. His female companion was a bit more restrained, but her appetite too was rather obviously quite large.

“What now?” she whispered, after throwing the woman behind the counter a surreptitious glance. “We can’t walk around aimlessly forever.”

Harry nodded annoyedly. “A few more minutes, then we’ll get on one of the lifts with someone and I’ll get the information we need,” he whispered back.

They finished their meal in silence, having hashed out their next step and worried as they were about being overheard. With how hungry they were, it actually did not take all long for them to clean away everything. Harry had just stepped outside the mess when, and he could hardly believe his luck, the young officer they had hoped to prevent from making a most likely fatal mistake, was striding by. Unfortunately, he had the aura of a man on a mission, all of his bearing screaming to anyone with even the least bit of knowledge of the human nature that something was going on.

He shot his companion a short look, which she returned, nodding almost imperceptibly. Agreed on their course of action, they set to follow the cagey officer to prevent him from doing the exact same kind of reckless thing Harry was usually prone to do.

As it turned out, their rapidly altered plan did not differ all that much from the one they had made in the mess, as they followed the man in the grey uniform into one of the lifts. It was a rather tight fit, and their clothes clearly set him on edge, but he would survive.

“What do you think you’re doing?” Harry opened, harsher than he had intended to be. Obviously, the time he had spent in isolation had taken its toll on his people skills.

The young officer was clearly terrified. “I… I… I don’t know what you mean…” he stammered, rather unconvincingly.

“Oh please,” Arden scoffed in reply. “You’re going to try and reach Mody’s cell, heroically free him. Then what? Defect?”

By that point, their unwitting guest had taken on a colour scheme that roughly matched Harry’s transfigured uniform. “Relax, were not with the secret police, we want to help you,” he said. “First part is a warning; do you really think Yularen is stupid enough to announce, for everyone and their cousin to hear, where he would bring his prisoner? I doubt you become a colonel in the secret police of an evil empire by being stupid. It’s bait.”

Somewhat mollified, if still definitely terrified, the officer looked at them. “Who are you?” he finally managed to ask.

“This is Arden Tla, I’m Harry Potter,” Harry introduced the two of them. “You?”

Before the young man could answer, there was a deep thrumming that went through the entire station, and the lights flickered ominously. Even the motion of the lift, if the small feeling of deceleration Harry felt in his stomach was any indicator, was affected.

“Oh, no…” the young officer muttered, his pale complexion from when he had thought he had been found out returning with a vengeance. “They really did it… they fired it.”

Both the sudden technical anomalies and the man’s reaction to them deeply troubled Harry. “They fired what?” he asked urgently.

“The… the superlaser,” the young man muttered. “My goodness, they really fired it.”

When he finally caught his footing again, he returned his attention to Harry and Arden. “Lieutenant Mercer Fenwick,” he introduced himself, although it sounded rather lacklustre. “I think they fired the station’s main weapon. It’s a superlaser, capable of destroying a planet. But they always said it was only meant to break up dead planets and asteroids…”

“Be calm, Mercer Fenwick,” Arden soothed. “Then why do you think the laser being fired is such a bad thing?”

Not appearing calm, or even calmer, at all, the lieutenant replied, “Because last I checked, we were in the Alderaan system. There are no unmined planets here, and the asteroid belts are not large enough to mine profitably with this much effort. The only thing that might be considered a target would be Alderaan itself.” Seeing their blank expression, he continued, “How can you not know this?”

“We’re not from around here,” Harry replied evasively. “Please go on. Also, what were you planning?”

“Alderaan is a nest of anti-Imperial sentiment. There must have been at least two billion people down there,” he answered heatedly. “Alright, concentrate now!”

Harry watched as the distraught man closed his eyes, breathed in and out a few times, and visibly calmed down.

“Mercer… is it okay if I call you Mercer?” the wizard asked, receiving a nod in return. “Alright, Mercer, Arden and I plan to leave this station by stealing a ship. I have some… unique talents that are going to help with that. Can you fly?”

Mercer nodded eagerly.

“Are you sure about this? You’ll be defecting,” Harry replied, wanting to make sure that everyone was on the same page.

“Yes,” their new ally replied. “I can’t work for people who would just slaughter billions of people. Even Alderaan did not have only dissidents.”

“Alright then,” Arden commented with a smile. “What was your plan, then?”

The young future defector wrinkled his nose at the question. “Seemed like a good idea at the time… I used a code cylinder I got from a drunken Admiral in the bar to access the secure logs to find out where the Captain was being held.” He winced. “Think Yularen falsified the records?”

Both of the stowaways nodded. “Well, I…”

He did not get to finish his sentence, because Harry had noticed they were still moving, and quite rapidly again, at that, toward the button Mercer had originally pressed. In fact, there were only two possible stops left before their target, and they had sufficient cause to believe that the only thing waiting on the other end of the opening door would be a firing squad. Out of options, he pressed the one remaining stop between them and certain doom.

Sublevel 5.

OOOOOOOO

Lieutenant Childsen was having a rather mediocre day. Usually, the opportunity to see enemies of the New Order get their just desserts was something he relished, and the pain of the Princess of Alderaan, traitorous scum that she was, certainly deserved nothing less than pure elation for those in service of the Empire. However, any interaction of a fleet officer with Lord Vader bore significant risk for any of the officers involved.

Vader was, after all, known to be rather volatile. 

“Enfield,” he called across his station in front the corridor that made up level five of his detention block. “Prepare the Princess’ cell. Another mistake and you’ll get the one next to her.”

A dour expression affixed to his face, the sergeant major trotted down the corridor, his dejected movements eliciting a small, cruel smile on the lips of his superior. Before he had expected it to happen… No, before Enfield had finished, lazy slob, a turbolift arrived. He had just about enough time to make out one navy lieutenant and two ISB captains, the male of which was carrying around a crude stick, before a lovely warmth settled in his head. Childsen could not remember exactly what happened afterward, but he knew he was happy to do everything he was asked to.

OOOOOOOO

“Are you some kind of Jedi?” Mercer asked, looking at the spaced-out officer.

“What’s a Jedi?” Harry asked, all the while watching their surroundings warily. The cameras might have been fooled the moment he cast the appropriate spell, but it was generally better to be safe than sorry; it was a lesson he had gotten the hard way and was now dedicated to actually learn from.

His new ally looked at him as if he had a screw loose, but answered, nonetheless. “They were this weird religious sect, rumoured to have some kind of supernatural power,” he said, waving his hand dismissively. “Bogus, if you ask me.”

“There’s no one else here,” Arden called from within the corridor that contained the cells. “Certainly no princess. Ask him again.”

Harry returned his attention to the officer in the black uniform. “How many prisoners does this level have at the moment?” he repeated his earlier question, with predictable outcome.

“There is currently one prisoner assigned to detention block AA-23, cell number 2187: Princess Leia Organa of Alderaan, former member of the Imperial Senate; traitor; currently awaiting execution. To be subjected to enhanced interrogation until she supplies intelligence or is executed,” the black-clad lieutenant repeated the exact same answer, in the exact same monotone.

The wizard was just about to wake up the second guard, the one he had stunned, not the one Arden had shot, when something occurred to him.

“Where is this prisoner _right now_?” he asked, emphasising the importance of the last two words.

The officer tapped on his screen for some time, emotionlessly looking through what looked like long lists.

“The Princess has been confirmed to be on her way back,” he finally said, just as Harry heard a slight whirring sound behind him. The sound he had heard from the lift he had been inside earlier.

“Arden,” the wizard called. “We’re going to have some unfriendly visitors really soon.”

There was nothing more that needed to be said, as the witch, the wizard and the defector lined up next to the exits of the shafts, staff and blaster rifles at the ready.

Seconds crept away feeling like minutes until, finally, the door of the elevator hissed open and a group of three, two of the white-armoured stormtroopers pushing around a young woman garbed in a loose white outfit that somehow managed to both conceal most of her body, while also displaying it. Staff in his right, Harry raised his left hand, pointing first at the left trooper, then at Arden, who had taken up position on the corresponding side of the elevators, then at himself and the right one. He did not have the heart to involve Mercer in fighting against his former comrades this quickly.

3…

2… one of the fingers raised on his left hand went down.

1… another one.

0…

As the third finger went down to completely his fist once again, Harry and Arden, almost simultaneously, fired; his staff let loose a powerful stunner that he was quite certain would fell his opponent, while Arden’s Harry-modified E-11 sent a powerful blaster bolt into the left stormtrooper. Within moments, certainly faster than their surprised captive could really comprehend in her shock, the soldiers were out of commission. Just to make sure, both received another strong stunner.

All the while, the lieutenant in charge of the detention block was still staring cluelessly into the distance.

OOOOOOOO

In his meditation room, deep in the bowels of the Death Star, Darth Vader was deeply immersed in his thoughts. No pleasant immersion, mind you; no, the mind of the Emperor’s apprentice was filled to the brim with hatred and the memories that inspired that hatred.

Mustafar, Coruscant, Tatooine, Naboo.

Yoda, Obi-Wan, Palpatine.

Mustafar, Coruscant, Tatooine, Naboo.

Yoda, Obi-Wan, Palpatine.

Deep within the swirling hatred bubbling inside his reactor heart, steadily pumping blood through his mangled, pained body, no change to his heart rate whatsoever, despite his rising fury, there was one thing he hated most.

Himself.

That hatred was tinged with something else, though, an almost imperceptible ounce of regret, mourning even, over the life he had lost.

The life he had taken, from his wife and his unborn child.

Never, though, did he allow that ounce of remorse to grow too much, gain too much influence over him because where his hatred made him strong, remorse would make him weak.

Darth Vader needed to be strong, as it was the right of the Sith. Not weak and delusional, like the Jedi.

His ruminations were interrupted by a disturbance in the Force that he could not rightly place…

It was unlike what he usually felt from the Dark Acolytes his Master surrounded himself with, and which he could only assume would be present on the giant battle station, but it was definitely not a Jedi, either. Definitely an intriguing feeling and warranting of further examination; any kind of new application for the Force was, after all, either a danger or a possible asset, probably both. And if he could just kill his Master, his agony might finally end, and he would take his rightful place as the ruler of the galaxy.

OOOOOOOO

The two stormtroopers had barely been felled, when the figure between them, a rather short and petite woman (Princess Leia Organa, Harry assumed), was already on one knee, the right guard’s E-11 pointed firmly at him and Mercer. Luckily, she did not seem to be the ‘shoot first, ask questions later’ type. Maybe she had just been swayed by their attacking her captors. Nevertheless, his white uniform did make her narrow her eyes warily.

“A little young to be an ISB _senior_ captain, aren’t you?” she asked, raising her eyebrows at Harry’s getup.

He just about managed to chuckle, even with the deadly weapon trained on his chest. “Arden Tla, former Lieutenant Mercer Fenwick, Harry Potter,” he indicated each person as he said their name. “We intend to leave this station and through a set of interesting circumstances found ourselves in this cell-block. When that guy,” he pointed at the blank-faced security officer, “said there was only one prisoner in the entire block, we thought you might want a ride off the station.”

“Leia Organa,” the woman, maybe girl, Harry decided, introduced herself. “What’s wrong with him?”

Harry looked at the officer, a guilty feeling in his stomach; he definitely did not like using the Imperius Curse, despite the new perspective extensive consideration had given him on the supposedly unforgivable curses.

“Harry has some special abilities,” Arden explained, seemingly clocking onto Harry’s discomfort. “It’s like mind control, but he really doesn’t like doing it.”

Leia’s eyes went wide. “You’re a Jedi?” she asked hopefully. “I was hoping to find a Jedi named Obi-Wan Kenobi, do you know him? Wait, you’re too young to have been a member of the Order.”

The wizard, not Jedi, although it became increasingly obvious that some kind of standard explanation for this would make a certain kind of sense, replied, “No, not a Jedi; Something else, sorry. And I don’t know this Obi-Wan, either.”

Although seeming a bit disappointed, the princess looked at him happily. “I’ll take what I can get. What’s our next move?”

The group of three that had sprung the ambush on Leia’s captors looked at each other with a deer-in-the-headlight expression.

“We never said we had a plan,” Harry defended. “I guess we’ll just take the fastest ship we can and make a run for it.”

Leia looked at the three of them almost with pity; it honestly ruffled Harry’s feathers a bit.

“Where are the tractor beam projectors, and how can we knock them out?” she asked the security officer, still standing apathetically at his station. “Come on, answer me.”

“Answer her,” Harry ordered the officer. The Imperius Curse would only work for him, unless he ordered for someone else to be in command, too.

Emotionlessly, the officer began to talk.

OOOOOOOO

“It’s an MRX-BR Pacifier,” Leia whispered next to him. “Scout vessel; powerful sensors, decent armament, strong hyperdrive with lots of redundancy. Should be exactly what we need.”

They were standing, Harry in his uniform (although he had traded his code cylinders with the security officer and transfigured his rank tag), Leia under a disillusionment charm, in a smaller hangar a good deal away from the internment block she had been held in; at least from a normal, human perspective. In relation to a giant battle station it probably was not all that far. The only vessel currently inside the otherwise empty hangar was grey, perhaps twenty to thirty meters long and about twice as wide.

“It’s one of their newer ships,” she went on, a bit louder now that it was clear the hangar was indeed completely devoid of any personnel. “They’re meant for exploration, so they’re suited for long-term living. The Empire always keeps them stocked up, too.”

While he admittedly did not know all that much about starships, even Harry knew that what he was hearing sounded exactly like what they needed. If they were to be fugitives, having both enough space and some food to last them a while would be nothing but beneficial. Especially the part about the food appealed to him, able as he still was to easily recall the gnawing hunger the hunt for the horcruxes had entailed all too often.

“How do you know this stuff?” he asked, tearing his attention away from the sleek vessel and turning it to the empty-looking space where he could just barely make out Leia’s silhouette beneath his disillusionment charm. “You can’t be much older than me, and I’m only nineteen.”

“Then we’re the same age,” Leia replied, and he could almost hear her smile. “I’m part of the Rebellion; it was always a question of when, not if, the Empire would find out. It was thought prudent that I would learn everything available about the ships that would one day be shooting on me. I’m actually a senator; well, former senator, now. My father had been planning on me succeeding him since I was very young.”

Harry could not help but compare the very different lives they had led; both destined, or at least expected, to do things better left to the adults in their lives. Yet, while Leia seemed to have gotten every bit of training she could possibly need, he himself had been coddled almost to death by a well-meaning, if rather misguided old man.

“Do you think you can do your thing on the flight controller?” Leia’s voice cut through his mulling.

He shook his head to distract himself from the flurry of thoughts that had been running wild inside his head. “I’d rather not,” the wizard replied. “At least not the exact same thing, because we don’t really need to, and I really don’t like doing it. Let’s just say that I can make him believe that we are supposed to head out with that ship. Should work even better and I won’t feel so… icky afterward.”

OOOOOOOO

The day was not a good one for Lieutenant Childsen, as much was clear. His detention block was empty, the Princess having been relocated due to security concerns, and Enfield was absent due to some health issue. As a result, he was guarding an empty prison with no company at all.

Now admittedly, Enfield was neither very intelligent nor all that pleasant, but even poor company was better than having to stand guard for eight hours without another soul nearby. Therefore, it came as quite the surprise when, against all odds, the silent whir of the turbolift stopped at his level, indicating he had a visitor (it could not be a transfer, he would have gotten an announcement of that).

However, when he saw who exactly his visitor was, he was much less thrilled than he had been before.

“L-Lord Vader, always a pleasure,” he stammered, although both of them knew how much it was not. “How can I serve?”

That empty plasteel mask turned toward him, and he could almost feel the disdain of the person, the monster beneath.

“The Princess. Take me to her cell,” the Emperor’s enforcer ordered dispassionately.

Childsen blinked at him owlishly. Did he not know the Princess had been relocated?

“Milord, I’m sorry, but the Princess is not here,” he explained, trying to sound as non-threatening, non-insulting as possible. Meanwhile, he also turned his attention onto his console, trying to find the entry on her relocation.

What he found instead made his blood freeze, because according to the listings, the traitorous former senator was still very much supposed to be in her cell.

In his cell block.

However, as quickly as his mind started trying to work it out, he did not get all that far, for he soon started to feel his throat constricting from more than just fear. His last sight was that of Darth Vader’s expressionless mask, hand raised in front of him, poised like he was choking the air itself.

OOOOOOOO

“That one,” Mercer hissed, poking Arden in the back. “He works in the armoury. Name is Ensign Ferris, he likes to watch explicit recordings of various aliens, mostly twilek; guy starts talking about stuff he shouldn’t when you get him drunk.”

The Dathomirian witch, still in her white uniform, quickly set to follow the broad-shouldered man in the grey jumpsuit with the black cap. She breathed in and out deeply a few times, preparing herself for a bit of acting; they had been hoping to find exactly this particular person because, according to Mercer, he was ‘a snivelling, spineless idiot’. Exactly the kind of person her ruse was most likely to succeed on.

“Ensign Ferris,” she sneered, doing her best to emulate some of the less reputable of her sisters, some of which had wholeheartedly embraced the forbidden spells of the Nightsisters. Apparently, it had worked, because the man she had named turned around like he had heard the mighty footsteps of a rancor behind him, and immediately paled at seeing her white tunic.

Arden was just about to continue when, for no apparent reason that she could think of, a loud noise started blaring through the corridor. An alarm, if she was not very much mistaken. Maybe it would actually be useful.

“You’re responsible for the closest armoury this shift, you will lead me there,” she ordered, her tone brooking absolutely no argument. For a moment the man (he had a shifty face, Arden decided) looked like he was about to object; a dangerous look he obviously took to be a promise of incredible pain convinced him otherwise.

Among the now greatly increased foot-traffic on the corridor, the participants of which still managed to keep a healthy distance from the ‘ISB agent’, they made their way to the close-by weapons storage, which Ferris opened with his code cylinder.

“That will be all,” Arden told him, as soon as she was across the threshold. Again, the ensign looked like he wanted to protest, and even the look that had cowed him before was not enough to erase his reluctance this time.

“That will be all,” she repeated, her voice dangerously quiet. “Either you leave, or I organise a _thorough_ search of your holonet history.”

Wide-eyed, Ferris fled the room, leaving behind a disillusioned Lieutenant Fenwick and a grinning witch, happily taking in all the equipment, now free for the taking.

“Good thing we brought that expanded bag,” Mercer observed.

OOOOOOOO

From the corner of his eye, Harry saw Arden step onto the gleaming black floor of the hangar, her presence a clear indicator that their plan had gone off as intended. A small smile on his face, he turned his attention to the junior officer manning flight control for the part of the station their getaway ship was moored in, silently raised his staff and whispered, “Confundo!”

The man shuddered a little, as people who were hit by the confundus charm were wont to do, and then stared blankly into the distance as Harry approached him from behind.

“The Pacifier scout in hangar 1-47 will be taken out for an important, secret mission by ISB Lieutenant Scamander,” he told the flight controller in a calm, steady voice, well-suited to the large degree of susceptibility the charm had induced. “You were ordered by Grand Moff Tarkin himself to keep this secret and the orders were deliberately left out of any electronic system. Do you understand?”

“The MRX-BR Pacifier in hangar 1-47 will be taken out for an important, secret mission by ISB Lieutenant Scamander. I was ordered by Grand Moff Tarkin himself to keep this secret and the orders were deliberately left out of any electronic system,” the officer replied in a monotone, and with a small tap of Harry’s staff, the man has lucid again.

“Lieutenant Scamander,” he introduced himself. “You have been briefed on my requirements? Is my ship ready?”

The flight controller snapped to attention.

“Yes, Sir. We always keep the scout ships ready to fly on a moment’s notice, sir,” he replied automatically.

“Good, good,” Harry replied coldly. “Remember, absolute secrecy.”

“Yes, sir. Only for the ears of the Grand Moff, sir.”

Without another word, Harry, Leia (hopefully) in tow, strode toward the turbolift and pushed the button for the hangar.

“You’re not that bad an actor,” the disembodied voice of the Alderaanian princess commented. “Do we need to be worried?”

Harry chuckled a little; yes, he had put on quite the show, even if he did say so himself.

“No reason to be,” he soothed overly grandiosely. “I had to play a bad guy once before, and it did not end well. I took that lesson to heart.” With a full blown grin now gracing his face, the scary agent joked, “And who knows, maybe there’s an actor somewhere inside me?”

Her could almost feel the young woman smile at his joke, and despite the dire circumstances, Harry found himself buoyed by the lighter mood as well. Only moments after they had boarded the turbolift, the ride stopped at their target floor, and the doors swished open, revealing their ship already heating up its engines (at least, that was what Harry assumed the glowing lights in the back meant). They were almost at the open ramp when a feeling of darkness, not unlike the one Voldemort’s horcruxes had elicited in him made him turn.

In the blast door, right beside the turbolift shaft, stood the imposing figure of a black-armoured warrior. In his right hand, he held a glowing red sword, while the left was raised, almost as if gripping him all across the room. Led more by instinct than anything else, Harry raised his staff and screamed, “Protego!”, right before some kind of attack, as potent as any of the spells he had resisted from the Death Eaters, slammed into the shield. The dark lord, for he had no doubt that that was what this black-clad warrior was, seemed to be unprepared for his attack to be rebuffed that way and was thrown bodily into the corridor behind him. In typical Harry manner, he was just about to set off after his foe to use the momentary confusion to his advantage, when a hand on his shoulder stopped him.

“No, that’s Darth Vader,” Leia said, the urgency in her voice undeniable. “We’ll be lucky to escape him alive.”

As much as it rankled him, that dark aura more than anything else told Harry she was right. “Colloportus,” he cast imperiously, raising his staff toward the blast door, which indeed started to slide shut inexorably slowly. Happy that, at least for the moment, people would be unable to follow them he grabbed Leia’s hand and they sprinted for the lowered ramp.

“Launch, now!” the young woman called as soon as the ship was sealed behind them.


	7. Career Change

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: The Star Wars and Harry Potter copyrights lie with their respective owners, should any of them have any problem with my story being shared, I will comply with their wishes and remove it from circulation.  
> Please do not copy this work or any part of it.

When Harry and Leia reached the cockpit, the ship was already thrumming under their feet.

“We were attacked,” Leia said, as soon as the young wizard had dispelled the disillusionment charm on her, making way for the pilot’s chair.

“Hey, occupied,” came Mercer’s disembodied voice. “Harry, could you maybe take off that charm thing?” The entire group snickered at Leia’s rapidly reddening face, even while Arden made room for her to sit down in the co-pilot’s chair and Harry dispelled the charm on Mercer.

“There weren’t any troops, so hopefully there won’t be any fighters coming after us in the near future,” the Princess continued, already working on something at the workstation in front of her. “But Vader was there; he tried to attack us, but Harry somehow managed to repel him. Just fly straight to the edge of the system, I’ll have the nav-computer prepare the jump.” The last bit had been added for Mercer’s benefit, who was now rapidly working away on the controls in front of him.

“Harry, could you keep an eye on the scanner, see if anything shows up?” Leia asked, pointing at a screen on the wall right next to her. “If you see any more dots than the one in the middle and that massive thing behind us, you tell us.”

He took one look at the screen, then turned back to look at the two people on the chairs. “There’s one more dot,” he told them, pointing at the little sensor contact they were rapidly closing in on.

Leia immediately started tapping away on her console again, until she jumped out of her chair and placed herself in front the screen, shoulder to shoulder with Harry.

“Huh,” she commented. “Corellian freighter, older model, modified. Looks like a piece of scrap. They seem to be fighting a tractor beam. Let’s see if we can’t make some new friends…”

Back to the seat she went, now working on the controls between her and Mercer. “Corellian freighter, you need some help?” she asked into what Harry now understood to be the communications console. “I assume you are not in the situation you want to be in?”

For a few seconds, there was only static on the other end of the line. Then suddenly, not only one, but two voices could be heard.

“Oh no, everything under control here,” the first one grumbled sarcastically, somehow giving off the feeling that it was not unusual to hear this voice in exactly the same inflection.

“That sounds like the woman on the recording inside R2,” a very excited, and considerably higher, if still masculine voice called in the background. “Ben, I think we found her.”

That seemed to pique Leia’s interest more than just a little. “General Kenobi, is that you?” she asked eagerly leaning toward the console.

“The old man is a general?” the deeper voice queried. “Never would have guessed. Now, as much as I enjoy this meet-and-greet, if you don’t happen to have a way of disabling the tractor beam, we won’t be doing anything more than that, anytime soon.”

Seeing a certain wisdom in that observation, even though he already had some kind of instinctive dislike of the voice on the other side of the connection, Harry turned to Arden and inclined his head sharply.

“Blow the charges,” he ordered and, turning toward where Leia had been speaking into earlier, he added, “The tractor beam should lose power right about… now.”

Indeed, as the grinning Dathomirian witch lowered her thumb on the detonator, a group of high powered charges exploded inside the monstrosity of a space-station behind them. As three of the energy couplings supplying power to the tractor beams were turned to very expensive shrapnel, the force pulling in the other ship winked out. Immediately, the sensor contact for the Corellian freighter stopped coming closer and was now simply matching their speed on a trajectory away from the moon-sized installation behind them.

“So, now that we’re free, where can I go to get paid?” the voice on the other side of the console asked, his lack of manners managing to elicit a very annoyed frown on Leia’s face; understandable, considering she had probably been drilled in following manners her whole life, even though Harry got the feeling she would have rebelled against that.

“Excuse me?” she questioned agitatedly. “Who are you, and why would I pay you?”

“Woah, Lady, cool down. Han Solo, Captain of the Millenium Falcon, fastest ship on the Outer Rim,” the man introduced himself. Still, going by the Princess’ eye roll and expression, she was not impressed. “I was hired to bring these people to Alderaan, and I did. Not my fault Alderaan isn’t there anymore. As you seem to be the one they were looking for, I consider myself done. Now, I’d like to get paid, so I can get rid of the bounty on my head.”

Leia groaned audibly, then muttered, “Smugglers…”

“Alright,” she added, loud enough for Solo to hear, “we’ll meet up, I’ll send you coordinates. What’s the hyperspace rating on your ship?”

“0.5,” came the prompt reply, intense smugness radiating across the connection; somehow it reminded Harry of Draco boasting about his Nimbus 2001, so long ago. “Wait, Grandine? That is not along a hyperspace lane. We need to get out of here fast. Do you want me to wreck my ship?”

This time, it was Mercer who replied. “We stole a scout ship,” he explained almost mechanically, definitely absent-minded. “It’s a relatively short jump, so the nav-computer on this thing can easily calculate the path for you. We’ll send you everything you need to not ‘wreck your ship’.”

The Imperial defector’s fingers were flying over his console now, instructing the nav-computer, Harry assumed, and he soon turned to Leia, indicating with a nod that whatever his exact task had been, he was now done.

“We’re limited to a class 1,” Mercer instructed the smuggler. “I’ll transmit the hyperspace route and we’ll meet you at the coordinates.”

Without another word, the connection was severed and the two ships continued to speed away from the moon-sized space station. Soon, the Millenium Falcon was at the edge of the system, as Mercer had said they needed to be for the jump. And indeed, within moments of clearing the strongest effects of the local gravity wells the sensor contact vanished. Not soon after, their captured vessel followed.

OOOOOOOO

Harry was sitting in one of the two chairs of what would probably be called a common area, maybe a lounge, by his normal reality’s standards. What it was called on a spaceship, he had little idea. He had found among the ‘food’ stashed upon the vessel some ready-to-eat rations that were most definitely utilitarian in nature and not designed for their palate-pleasing nature; still, with the addition of some of the provisions he still had with him, scavenged in the jungles of Dathomir, they were edible, and he was hungry.

“That looks… tasty,” Leia commented as she sat down on the second chair. “Beats out protein paste any day.”

The young wizard chuckled; obviously he had no idea what protein paste was, but anything that could be described as paste would have to be treated with serious suspicions as to its culinary qualities, as far as he was concerned.

“It’s edible and I’m hungry,” Harry replied, deciding to go for light conversation. The woman was, after all, the Princess of Alderaan: Native to a planet that no longer existed.

“That’s something,” she replied, and as he saw the tightly guarded expression on her face, any plan of keeping the conversation light went out of the… well, not window, they were still in space. He had a feeling it would somehow end with crying.

“How are you?” he began. Yes, not too deep to start with, that was a good start.

“I’m fine,” Leia replied immediately, way too quickly for Harry’s liking; also, he was quite an expert on saying he was fine when he was anything but.

“You believe that about as much as I do,” he observed, looking at her closely. “I’ll ask again and inform you that I am a master of ‘being fine’ while I’m actually anything but.”

Her trained countenance, as well as her obviously stubborn and vivacious spirit, made sure that her loss of control was neither fast nor complete, but it was visible, at least to Harry.

“My… my parents were down there,” she whispered waspishly. The princess shook her head violently at the thought, shaking loose the donut-shaped braids laid at the side. Admittedly, Harry had never been that much of a friend of physical contact, so it came as a surprise to both of them when, more out of instinct than any real decision, he lightly put his hand on her shoulder in a comforting grip.

“I hope…” Leia sighed deeply, or maybe it was a steeling breath. “I hope my sister wasn’t home.” Harry simply squeezed her shoulder once.

“So, my heroic saviour,” the freshly orphaned woman went on, already pulling back behind her barriers. “What is the next step in your dashing rescue plan?”

Harry forgave her the obvious attempt to change the subject, Merlin knew he had done it often enough when things started moving into painful topics, and removed his hand.

“Well, we’ll have to figure out that Solo guy, otherwise, he’ll never leave us alone. Especially if there’s a bounty on him,” he mused absently. “You wouldn’t happen to have any cash on you, would you?”

Leia laughed lightly, and even though he could tell it was a little forced, the sound warmed Harry’s heart.

“Why yes, actually all my money was the only thing the Imperials left on me when they threw me into my cell,” she joked back, making him immediately feel bad about joking in such serious circumstances. Obviously, it showed. “Oh, don’t look at me like I drowned your pet womp-rat; you were just trying to cheer me up, I appreciate it. Still have to figure out how to pay the smuggler, though. And you’ll need to give your ship a name.”

It took a while for Harry to process everything she had said. “We could always give him some of the stuff Mercer and Arden took from the armoury… wait, my ship?”

Leia shrugged before giving him an innocent smile. “I have a feeling you’re going to be needing a ship,” she replied simply. “Both Mercer and I would be sitting in a cell right now if not for you and Arden, and she insists she would be dead if it weren’t for you. So yes, your ship.”

It was a weird feeling, Harry decided. Sure, it was stolen and, judging from everything else he had seen not all that big either, but it had been stolen from the bad guys, making it justly taken villain-tax. Additionally, despite any comparisons he could make to some of the other things he had seen around, even this small vessel was easily the size of his relatives’ house on Privet Drive.

With all that thinking going on in his head, one thing had slipped his mind; what name to give to _his_ new ship. For a moment he considered naming her Hermione, but immediately discarded the idea. Somehow it felt wrong to name a simple thing after his brilliant best friend, as far away as he might now feel removed from that life sometimes.

“This ship is intended to explore space, right?” he asked, fishing for any ideas that might help in the naming process; Lei nodded. Not helpful at all, if you asked Harry. “A pioneer…”

He mulled it over for another few minutes, until he finally came up with something he liked.

“ _Morningstar_ ,” the displaced wizard decided. “I’ll call her _Morningstar_.”

OOOOOOOO

“Any ideas?” Harry asked, leaning against the wall in the lounge, looking expectantly at Arden and Mercer, who were now sitting at the table, ‘enjoying’ the military rations. “Leia and I had some, but I’d like to know what you think.”

“Well,” Mercer began, before taking another bite of the dried meat Harry had given him as a less bland addition to the pre-packaged meal. “We could always pay him with some of the things we took from the armoury. There’s some real good stuff in there, and your bag allowed us to take it all. Detonators, all kinds of guns, some officer armour. There’s even some stormtrooper armour. Illegal for a civilian to own, making it that much more valuable on the black market. Some of the best features are biometrically linked to the owner, though, so we would need a slicer to unlock those for us.”

“I would rather not give that man,” Leia sniffed audibly in annoyance, “any weapons or armour. He seems like the type that would do anything for some money. That’s without even considering whom he might pay using that gear.”

The room fell silent for a while as they all thought about the problem at hand.

“You’re part of the Rebellion, right?” Mercer asked, looking at Leia almost… hopefully. “Couldn’t they pay him?”

The Princess mulled it over, moving her jaw as if chewing something that was not there. “I’d rather not,” she finally said, still not sounding completely sure of herself. “He will most likely be transporting a droid that has vital information for our cause, but I’d still like to not lead that man to our secret base.”

Harry nodded immediately; it was a problem he was familiar with. “The more people know, the less of a secret it is,” he agreed. “If we had anything really valuable that is not a weapon, I could use my abilities to make more of it so that we can either sell some ourselves or use it to pay Solo.”

Looking into the round, it quickly became clear that none of them had anything on them that would fit the description which they would feel comfortable with when giving it to a smuggler.

“Any hard currency?” he ventured, again only receiving nos and shrugs. “Ah, damn it.”

“There might be something else,” Mercer finally commented, although it sounded more like he was thinking aloud than anything else. “We could always do some bounty-hunting.”

Obviously cognisant of the shocked and appalled faces all around him, he rushed to explain. “No rebels, or good people who just fell in with the wrong crowd,” he clarified, seeming almost offended by their reaction. Understandably, Harry mused. “I once served on a system patrol craft, so we had to keep a good eye on the wanted list. Believe me, for some of these people, Imperial justice is exactly the right thing.”

Harry thought the idea over and was surprised when he found himself liking the prospect. Helping himself and his friends by getting someone violent and dangerous off the street? It sounded rather enticing.

“Of course, without a license, we could only claim the local bounty, and even then only half, but we could use that money and what little I have on my credit chip to buy something for Harry to do his thing on,” the defector explained. With a bemused look he added, “Whatever Harry’s thing is.”

Mercer started tapping on a small console that was embedded into the table. “Holo-net,” he explained at Harry’s questioning glance. “Should tell us the active bounties in the Grandine system…”

The man rifled through multiple pages of pictures with accompanying text. Most showed simple-looking people, the amount promised for their capture often rather low or the reason for the warrant something like ‘insurrection’ or ‘insubordination of the New Order’. Finally, after five minutes of perusing had passed without luck, a gasp from Mercer alerted the rest of them that he had found something interesting.

“So that bastard’s still around,” he muttered, looking at the picture of a scarred, bald man. Harry had no idea why, but he got a certain expression of greed and shiftiness from the person depicted in the high-resolution photograph. “Goes by Lizard, no idea what his real name is.”

Without warning, he stood up and lifted the upper part of his uniform. “Gave me this,” Mercer explained, pointing at a small, round scar on the side of his torso. “Likes poking people he doesn’t like with knives and then leaves them to bleed out. I heard he had relocated but didn’t know where.”

They all looked at the now slowly rotating picture. “How did you run into him?” Arden eventually asked, watching the former Imperial curiously.

“Used to be a smuggler, then hit some kind of jackpot and started his own little ‘business’,” Mercer described, even as he started pacing up and down the room; as much as pacing was a possibility, given the rather limited space. “Mostly dealt in spice, some exotic animals, slaves from time to time. Anything that could make him some credits. We were assigned to smoking out his base and I was in charge of the ground team.”

Unflappable as he normally was, Mercer shuddered at the memory. “We were ambushed, outnumbered three to one. I only survived because Lizard left me behind to bleed out, but I was found by some reinforcements, who were originally meant to help us round up the stragglers,” he almost reported, monotonously speaking of events that might have simply happened to someone else as far as his delivery was concerned. “Found out later that we had been sold out by an informant and lured into a trap. After that, the brass didn’t consider him troublesome enough to mount something larger.”

Leia threw the man a dubious glance. “Look, I know you hate the Empire, especially right now, but it is not all bad and it is not all people like Tarkin,” he said vehemently, drawn out of his memory-induced stupor. “Most of the guys that sign up don’t do it because they want to stomp any semblance of free will; they join up because their heads have been stuffed full of propaganda, or they want to help keep their neighbours and their friends safe. Problem is that most of these people don’t make it far in the Imperial hierarchy. This man is not a Rebel, or any kind of freedom fighter; he’s just a vile criminal, nothing more, nothing less.”

As much as she seemed to dislike it, as evidenced by her taught face, the young woman who had been the main audience of this declaration nodded.

“Yeah, I know you’re right,” she finally admitted. “Those are the ones that, if they have the courage, join the Rebellion at some point. There’s a reason so many of our people are former Imperials. Still, what gives you the idea that we could capture a man who managed to take out an entire Imperial ground team?”

There was a mad gleam now visible in Mercer’s eyes, making it painfully obvious that he had been dying for someone to ask that question. “Well, after our failed mission, there was one more piece of intel I was able to recover,” he explained gleefully. “The Lizard has a vice that he simply can’t control; man likes playing sabacc, and for huge sums too. Legal businesses don’t let him in, either.”

After another smug look at the picture he finished, “We find the illegal casino with the highest limits, we find the Lizard. Might be a good idea to change out of the uniform, though…”

OOOOOOOO

The planet Grandine, going by the same name as the system it was in, might once have been a beautiful world. If so, Harry could see little of that now. Where there might once have been a clear sky, there was now only the stifling twilight of an atmosphere filled to the brim with pollutants. No one seemed to know, how exactly it had ended up like this, but everyone agreed, that it was most likely not Grandine’s natural state. The few plants that were able to grow in the diminished light and shrug off the frequent storms were of an uninviting nature and so obviously inedible, that the wizard had to wonder, whether there was any significant population of herbivores left.

Still, inhospitable as it was, the spaceport both the _Morningstar_ and the _Millenium Falcon_ had landed in was bustling with activity. Obviously seeing, and correctly interpreting Harry’s wandering gaze, Mercer proceeded to explain.

“It’s unimportant enough for the Empire not to care, but close enough to the core to be an excellent place for a smuggling operation,” he said quietly, unwilling to draw any serious attention.

The three of them, Leia had stayed in the ship, were wearing long, dense coats Harry had transfigured to protect them, both from rain as well as the eyes of the locals. Underneath, they were all wearing the chest armour usually worn by Imperial officers in the field. Each of them was also wearing a blaster pistol, just to be safe.

“Forget self-defence,” Harry muttered, looking around warily. “We would’ve had to bring those blasters anyway, just to fit in with the crowd.”

Arden chuckled darkly, letting her eyes roam around like a predator. Harry had not considered how different the environment had to be for her, seeing as she was from a predominantly tribal culture who she herself had said tended to live in small villages. Still, she seemed to avail herself surprisingly well, despite the throngs of humanity (as well as alien-kind) flowing all around them.

“What did they promise that smuggler again?” Mercer asked quietly, looking at both of the others in turn.

“2000 up front, 15000 on Alderaan,” Harry replied. “The bounty?”

“50000 sector bounty,” came the prompt reply. “But we have neither a certificate nor an Imperial Peace-Keeping permit, so we can only claim half of the local bounty. Still 20000 credits.”

They kept silent after that, wary of nosy listeners in the crowd, and simply followed the instructions provided to them by one of the dock workers, who had pointed them to the local cantina. When they finally reached the building, it was not all that much removed from what Harry had expected, and somehow reminded him of the Hog’s Head. There was a multitude of different creatures, even though humans were still the majority, and all of them were drinking, talking or jeering. In one corner, a large blue-skinned, red-eyed humanoid was fighting violently with a broad-shouldered human man. There was a general feeling of depredation around the whole place that was profoundly unsettling.

The barkeeper, a green-skinned humanoid whose facial structure strongly reminded Harry of an insect, glared at their audacity in nearing his little kingdom.

“What do you want, human?” he asked belligerently. Before Harry could say anything, Arden took a step forward and, without the movement being all that visible to anyone involved, had her hand on the blaster she had strapped to a leg-holster.

“Now, be nice,” she hissed. “We just wanted some information and we were willing to pay for it. Now, though, that payment will be me not making a mess of you. Sound fair?”

He gulped, looking warily at the pistol pointing toward his stomach. “Great,” Arden replied, distressingly cheerfully, and even with a wide smile. “Your turn,” she added in Harry’s direction.

The wizard stepped forward now, directly in front of the counter, and pushed the Dathomirian’s gun away. “You’ll have to forgive my partner. She’s a bit… overzealous,” he apologised. “We were looking for a place where we could play sabacc. High stakes, no nosy Imperial bureaucrats.”

Nodding enthusiastically, whether out of fear or simply to get rid of them as fast as possible, Harry did not know, he began describing the way. When they were back outside the seedy establishment, he turned a disapproving glare at his earliest companion in this new world.

“Was that really necessary?” he asked accusingly. “Sure, the place was bad news, and the guy an arse, but that was a bit too far, don’t you think?”

Instead of answering, Arden turned to Mercer. “What can you tell us about his species?” she asked expectantly.

“Rodians,” the man replied, as if it was enough of an explanation. It probably was, for most everyone else. “Very violent culture, war-like. If you find any off-world, they’re often either criminals or refugees. Even as refugees, they often still respect strength above all else. Arden’s right, this was the best way to go about this.”

Harry continued grumbling for a while, but ultimately accepted their position; not that he would not later go back to do something nice for the Rodian. Ultimately, and not all that much later, they reached the underground casino they suspected their quarry would frequent. He flinched violently when one of the things Mercer called com-links beeped on his belt. Just like the defector had shown him, the young wizard took the unit and held it up to his ear.

 _“Leia here,”_ came the voice of the princess, a little craggy but definitely understandable and directly attributable to the person. _“How are things going?”_

“We found the casino,” Harry replied. “I think it’s enough when only one of us hangs around and waits, no reason for us all to be standing around all day. You?”

 _“Not all that much going on, here,”_ she answered. _“General Kenobi is still on the Falcon. He refuses to leave, until he can make sure Solo gets paid.”_

“Alright, see you later,” the novice bounty hunter ended the call. “I can take the first watch.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi all, just so you know, if anyone wants to use my first chapter as a starting point for their own crossover, feel free to ask. I’m liable to say yes.  
> Hope you liked the new chapter, review, take care and goodbye.  
> alexandertheII


	8. A Good Deed a Day

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: The Star Wars and Harry Potter copyrights lie with their respective owners, should any of them have any problem with my story being shared, I will comply with their wishes and remove it from circulation.  
> Please do not copy this work or any part of it.

It took two full days for their target to appear from under whichever rock he had been hiding. During the time that Arden was watching the casino, Mercer was just getting ready to replace her, the com-link suddenly crackled.

_“Found him,”_ the witch reported over the connection that the former Imperial had assured them would be scrambled to high heaven. _“What should I do?”_

“Was he going in or coming out?” Mercer asked eagerly.

_“Going in,”_ Arden replied. _“Along with two bodyguards.”_

“Alright,” Harry decided. “Arden, you wait for Mercer to replace you, come back here and suit up. We’ll see if we can’t follow him to wherever he is hiding all his ill-gotten gains.”

It was an idea he and Mercer had bandied around during their evening meal the day before. A smuggler and criminal of Lizard’s stature, they assumed, would have some interesting things lying around in his operating base; money, drugs and weapons were all distinct possibilities. As were slaves, going by the man’s business record. Why let some other lowlife take these things after the end of Lizard’s criminal career, the defector had argued. They had an opportunity to take dangerous contraband out of circulation right then and there.

Unlike the previous plan, which had called for Mercer to be only lightly armoured, given that he would have been standing around for hours, he was now called upon to be as fully enclosed as possible. So, in addition to the officer’s chest plate, he adorned the greaves, thigh guards and bracers of a stormtrooper and concealed them under his wide coat. Finally, he put on the helmet that they had been foregoing for their surveillance activities. Harry tapped him on the head with his staff to apply a disillusionment charm.

The wizard had just begun, with some very welcome help from Leia, to put on his own protective gear when a disembodied voice by the door to the small corridor began speaking.

“Oh, you’re so cute together,” Arden’s voice said from the slight shimmer where a Dathomirian witch should be. “Don’t let me interrupt you.”

Predictably, both Harry and Leia started to redden rapidly after they had overcome the jump scare they had just been put through; despite all their unusual circumstances, they were still teenagers, after all.

“You’re getting way to good at sneaking up on people,” Harry commented after having finally taken the disillusionment off of Arden, who simply laughed it off and started gathering her own gear.

“I’ve spent half my life scouting and fighting,” she replied simply. “Being virtually invisible makes it almost ridiculously easy. Can you help me with this?”

Holding out a pair of white stormtrooper bracers, Arden turned to Leia, who was looking at her in annoyance.

“I still think I could help,” the Princess complained, a rather miffed expression affixed on her face. “I’ve had training with blasters for years, same with hand-to-hand combat.”

“And yet,” Arden interrupted before Leia really had a chance to get going, “taking you with us would be a liability. You’re important beyond this immediate fight, in which we happen to not need you, so we would have to protect you, which would be a distraction. So, for the moment, you’re more valuable in preventing anyone from stealing our shiny new ship.”

Despite her outward grumbling, Harry fancied himself enough of a judge of character to know that Leia was well aware of everything she had just been told beforehand. Maybe she had just been hoping to get a new perspective that would allow her to help, because otherwise, she would not allow herself to. That sense of duty, he decided, was quite remarkable.

“Ready?” Harry asked Arden as soon as he saw she had put on the helmet. The witch nodded, holstered her blaster rifle and ambled out the door, while he turned his sights on Leia.

“Be careful,” his fellow orphan said and, without warning, stepped forward to plant a small kiss on his cheek. “I’ll keep your ship safe.”

Without another word, Leia turned around, grabbed a blaster and planted herself in view of the entry hatch and the scanners, seemingly very intent on honouring her promise; Harry had no illusions about what she thought he was supposed to do regarding her demand. Still, while being careful was not really in his blood, he sure would try.

OOOOOOOO

“I hate staking things out…” Harry complained quietly as they were working up to their fourth hour of waiting in a dingy side-alley. The cold did not help, either.

“You done something like this before?” Mercer asked curiously. “You seem a bit young for that.”

The wizard snorted. “It wasn’t by choice,” Harry assured the man grumblingly. “More importantly, it was in the summer and on a much nicer planet.”

“Shh,” Arden hissed from the mouth of the alley, “I see our guy coming out. Looks pretty drunk.”

Immediately, the two men rushed next to her to look for their quarry. Indeed, at the door of the illegal gambling den stood the man they only knew as Lizard and recognised from the picture they had seen of him. He was stumbling, clearly inebriated, and actually had to be held up by one of the two guards that were flanking him on both sides.

“Pitiful,” the witch muttered. “Being what he is, he should always expect an attack and never let himself become so… weak and vulnerable.”

Disregarding Arden’s slighted warrior instincts for the moment, Harry left the alley behind and started following after Lizard and his two bodyguards, still disillusioned, making him invisible in the dark of night. Only the almost imperceptible sounds of muted footsteps told him the others were following him.

The group went after their target for what seemed like hours, though it was probably only mere minutes, his inebriated state making the man much slower than he otherwise would have been. Even his guards, who had been watching everyone and everything like a threat earlier were becoming more and more distracted by their stumbling and slurring boss. When they finally reached the city limits, Harry took down the disillusionment charms on the others, content in the knowledge that the almost complete darkness would hide them for the mere moments that were left of their chase.

“This is just too good an opportunity to pass off,” he told the others quietly. “We’ll ambush them, then I get the information we need in a… different way.”

As for himself, the wizard apparated down the fractured road they had been following, a strong silencing charm preventing the crack from alerting his quarry. He dispelled the disillusionment on himself, and then their trap struck.

As per bounty hunting regulations (and was the Empire not one to talk) they could not simply shoot and ask questions later. Instead, they had to give their target the opportunity to surrender. Not that Harry particularly cared about regulations the Empire had in place, but it might cost them the bounty they needed to pay the smuggler.

“Halt,” he called loudly and with all the authority he could muster, despite how ridiculous he must have looked with his staff in one hand and a blaster in the other. “You the one they call ‘the Lizard’.”

The drunken criminal, despite his guards’ best efforts to hold him back, stumbled forward with an evil glint of cruelty in his eyes.

“Fancy yourself a bounty hunter, runt? I’ll show you,” he declared boldly. Then, he retched on the ground.

“Just to be clear. You are indeed the one called ‘the Lizard’ and you are resisting arrest?” Harry clarified, just as the bodyguards started looking around nervously. It was too late however, as their boss started pulling the blaster pistol from his holster.

Within moments of each other, each of the three was hit in the chest by one of the blue rings indicative of a stun discharge and they all crumpled to the ground bonelessly. Immediately, the three hunters were on them, either binding each of their captives with cuffs they had ‘liberated’ from the Imperial armoury on the battle station or, in Harry’s case, simply using an incarcerus.

“So, _Boss_ ,” Mercer joked, glancing at Harry, “what are we going to do with these two?” He pointed at the two incapacitated bodyguards. A fascinating thought in mind, the ‘Boss’ grabbed for the com-link that was fastened to his belt.

“Leia, you there?” he asked, hoping his idea had merit.

_“Where else would I be?”_ came the somewhat snarky reply, although there was no real bite to it. _“How can I help the valiant bounty hunters?”_

The ‘Boss’ of the ‘valiant bounty hunters’ (and if Leia’s displeasure with the profession had not been clear before, it certainly was now) chuckled a little before answering. “Do you think you can bring the ship… wait a second.”

He turned to the one companion he had had the longest. “Arden, where are we?”

The witch raised an eyebrow, as if silently judging him for lacking the foresight to always know something this important. Still, she replied, “North of the city, around one kilometre along the old road.”

“Thanks,” Harry said, before returning to his com connection. “We’re around one kilometre north of the city along an old road. Do you think you can bring the _Morningstar_ here? I want to check, whether there are any outstanding bounties on the two bodyguards we captured, and I’d rather not carry them all the way back into the city.”

_“Be right there,”_ Leia replied promptly. _“I had the engines warmed up, just in case.”_

Only a few minutes had passed, as the darkness was pierced by the blindingly bright lights affixed to the front of the _Morningstar_ , which, in Harry’s mind, did lend further credence to the name he had chosen for his ship. So, while he busied himself with their incapacitated main target, Arden and Mercer took their two other captives inside.

“Rennervate!” Harry muttered, carefully limiting the power he sent into his staff; he had no intention of having the Lizard wake up fully. As soon as his eyes were open enough, the wizard added the second spell. “Legilimens.”

What he found inside the man’s mind was not pretty; he had been exposed to a lot of depravity during his years of school, both first- and second-hand, but Riddle had at least had the halfway decent excuse of being an unrepentant nutjob. Lizard, on the other hand, was simply greedy and willing to do anything for a decent payday.

“He doesn’t know a lot about those two, either,” he managed to press out after retreating out of the criminal’s mind. “They were never involved in his business beyond protecting him, so they would not be tempted to simply kill him and take over.”

“Any idea who they are?” Leia asked over his right shoulder, on which she had just placed a comforting hand in a kind of echo of the gesture he had made when they were talking about Alderaan days earlier.

“He had his suspicions,” Harry answered. “Look for deserters. Uhh, as soon as we’ve smoked out their lair, I’ll have to take a long shower, after being inside that guy’s head.”

The Princess threw him a nervous, yet intensely doubtful glance. “Are you sure that’s a good idea?” she asked cautiously, worry evident in every syllable. “You look like you could throw up at any moment, and the others are tired, too.”

Harry sighed wearily. “Yeah, I am. He learned from almost being taken down by the Imperials, and only trusts a few people with the location of his base. They only have a few guards standing watch over drugs, slaves, credits, weapons…”

Instead of wasting further breath talking, the young wizard stomped up the ramp into the _Morningstar_ intent on finding something to drink to quell the upset rifling through Lizard’s mind had caused him.

OOOOOOOO

“Homenum revelio,” Harry muttered. He was standing next to the mouth of a cave, Arden next to him, Mercer on the opposite side of the entrance. Just as expected, the spell showed the presence of over twenty people. Many of the contacts were clustered together; these, he took to be the slaves in their cages. The other five were scattered around system of tunnels stretching out beyond the black hole that was the main entrance to the secret lair.

“23 people,” he told the other two quietly. “18 clustered together in cages or something similar, five scattered around, two of them close to the entrance. On three, I put up a shield, you take out the two guards in the front.”

Receiving nods from bot Arden and Mercer, Harry held up his left hand and counted. One, two three.

“Protego,” the mage incanted, and a glowing shield appeared in front of him as he jumped into the middle of the entranceway to the dark cave. Immediately, his companions were on either side and firing, their blasters still on stun. While Mercers shot connected, shortly followed by a satisfying ‘thunk’ as the hit guard crumpled to the ground, Arden had fired off hers a fraction of a second later, allowing her target to crouch behind a metal barrier set up in front of a heavy door leading into the base proper.

Within moments, blaster bolts started hitting the shield, and Harry started really feeling the drain on his strength, as those highly energetic projectiles pounded the barrier he had set up. Not to be undone by such a simple thing as an armed and forewarned adversary, Arden set herself in motion, while Mercer kept peppering the area around their hunkered-down foe. Before the guard had much of an opportunity to react to the approaching danger, he had been violently wacked across the head with the butt of an E-11.

“How… anticlimactic,” she huffed annoyedly, looking at the felled criminal.

Mercer fixed her in a disapproving stare at hearing that. “Don’t get too cocky; there’s still three left.”

The group formed up around the door and one unlocking charm later, they filed into the cavern. The large room was mostly empty, the sole exception being a vehicle Harry assumed was one of the speeder things the people in this reality used instead of cars. Rather, in this case it would probably be more accurately called a transporter. Intent on finishing the whole business as soon as possible, Harry pointed his hand at where he had felt the other people, he did not take to be captives.

That was, when things turned south.

Out of nowhere, a hail of blaster bolts came flying into their direction. Well-trained reflexes, honed by both Quidditch and a simple need to survive, let Harry erect another shield that protected both him and Mercer. Arden though was less lucky. Just as before, and despite the debate she had had with Leia about taking unnecessary risks earlier, the Dathomirian witch had taken a more aggressive stance in her exploration of the hidden base.

A scream echoed from the walls as she fell to the ground, clutching her chest, and he felt eerily reminded of hearing similar sounds during the battle of Hogwarts. Despite his worry for his friend, Harry managed to stay somewhat put together, as he advanced with Mercer next to him, both still sheltered behind his shield charm.

“I’ll get you an opening,” the wizard muttered during a lull in the fighting. “But I’ll have to drop my shield to do it.”

Understanding flashing in his eyes, Mercer nodded and held his rifle at the ready, just as Harry dropped the shield charm and instead mutter, “Evanesco.”

At the back of the room, a barrier similar in style to the ones the guard outside had taken cover behind, suddenly vanished, showing a completely flummoxed, barely dressed and heavily tattooed man desperately trying to cool down what looked like an overheated weapon. He did not get a chance, for as soon as he was visible, the man was hit with Mercer’s stunner and crumpled to the ground.

Once again Harry swept over the caves with the presence revealing charm and was relieved to still find the other two presences he took to be guards where he had felt them first.

“You take a look at Arden, I’ll sort out the last two,” he decided, just before quickly slipping down a corridor to the side. Indeed, one door later he found two very much asleep guards, a man and a woman, who were both quickly stunned and bound. Only then did he allow his fear for Arden fill his mind, and he rushed back into the main cavern.

To his great surprise, the woman was already up again, if a little worse for wear. In fact, she was leaning against the truck parked in the cave, the severely burnt piece of armour lying beside her, and holding the right side of her chest.

“I’ll be okay,” the witch assured him as she saw him watching her closely. “I’ll be a bit sore for a few days, nothing more.” Obviously noticing how doubtful he still must have looked, she added, “Really, I’ll be fine.”

Harry nodded, mollified in the knowledge that his friend was not in any serious danger or pain. With his staff-free hand, he pulled out the communicator and contacted Leia on the _Morningstar_.

OOOOOOOO

“That’s a big load of credits,” Mercer commented, staring at the pile of currency they had found in what could only be Lizard’s ‘office’, tucked away in a safe that had not stood up all that well to Harry’s magic. “I’d have had to work months, maybe years to earn that much cash.”

“How much is it,” the mage questioned, his eyes as riveted on the glimmering pile as those of the people beside them.

“No idea,” the Imperial defector replied. “As I said, never seen such a load of money. Most people just use credit chips these days, anyway. I’ll get to counting, I suppose.”

Harry nodded in reply before leaving first the office and then the cave system itself; despite the nefarious purpose it had served, he was actually somewhat impressed by how well-hidden the base had been. From outside, only a glimpse of the wall with the guard post was visible, and the true scope of the underground lair was impossible to discern. On the flat surface in front of the mouth of the cave Leia had landed the _Morningstar_ , and some of the better-off slaves they had freed were already helping to bring on board the loot that did not have to be counted beforehand.

A few dozen metres away they had piled up the drugs, spice they called the stuff, and it was there that Harry now made his way. With glee at getting something as dangerous as he had been assured this glitterstim was, he waved his staff and lit the whole pile on fire.

Only to then immediately extinguish it again as the fumes burned in his eyes.

“Right, don’t burn drugs while you’re standing right next to them,” he muttered as memories of burning cauldrons and the interesting changes they could make to people filled his head.

“Harry,” he heard Leia’s voice call from the direction of his ship. Indeed, as he turned, he could see the Princess hurrying over. “I found out who our two guests are.”

If she herself had not been enough to catch his attention, which she certainly was, that was guaranteed to get him to listen.

“You were right,” the Princess continued. “They’re deserters, former Imperial Army. Can’t tell you much more than their names, though.”

“Names are always a good way to start,” Harry replied jovially, happy about the good deed the had done that day. 18 freed slaves were nothing to sniff at, after all.

“Javoc Perdiv and Corsek Betsby, then,” Leia supplied the names. “Other than desertion, there is no bounty out for either of them.”

During their talk, they had ambled closer to the loading ramp, which they were now ascending. Through the crew quarters, they finally reached the port cargo bay, where their ‘guests’ were currently detained. As a delightful surprise, both of the men they wanted to talk to were already awake again, while Lizard, perhaps due to the sleeping charm Harry had placed on him, was still out for the count.

“Hello, gentlemen,” he greeted the obviously wary deserters. “Don’t worry, no one here is going to hand you over to the Empire.”

His proclamation did a lot to calm the two, as did being given the keys to the cuffs they were still wearing.

“We do, however, want to make you an offer.”

OOOOOOOO

“53730 credits,” Mercer recounted his counting, while all of them were, once again, staring at the pile of credits Lizard had gathered in his lair. “Any plans? I assume ‘Ryncol and strip club’ won’t be acceptable, right? Ow…”

He had been punched into his upper arm by Arden. Hard.

“I was just joking,” he complained, then hid behind Harry and added, “Mostly.”

This time, he only got raised eyebrows in response, and from both females that were in the room, too.

“But seriously, this much money should not be squandered,” the deserter continued, now much more matter-of-factly. “I’ve served on and around a world like this; with some credits wandering into the right pockets, we could make Harry here into a legitimate bounty hunter, with a permit, a Captain’s license and everything else. Best thing, we can then claim the entire bounty for Lizard, too.”

From the looks on everyone’s faces, people seemed to like the idea; truth be told, Harry did too. It was the closest thing he could be to an auror in this new reality of his without selling his soul by serving the Empire. And going around, actually being paid for catching bad guys for a change, all the while getting to see a galaxy so much greater than he ever could have imagined? Well, it sounded like a dream come true.

“I still want you to take a cut though,” he proclaimed, looking at Arden and Mercer. “Not you, Leia,” he added teasingly. “We’re doing this to pay your debts, after all.”

The glare she shot him was somewhat undercut by the amused twinkling in her eyes; obviously her distaste for bounty hunters was somewhat mollified by who was doing it.

“I consider this an investment into the future,” the older man replied stubbornly. “If, after everything, there’s some left over, by all means, hold a blaster to my head and I’ll take it. What, we make a good team, only makes sense we stay together.” The last bit had obviously been added for Harry’s benefit, as he had looked a bit dumbfounded, while Arden just nodded sagely.

“We can choose, who to hunt, so I can still keep the peace like it was my goal when I joined the military, without having to go after people I don’t think should be punished, just because they have an unpopular opinion,” he explained, actually managing to hit the nail on the head, as far as ‘the Boss’ was concerned. “We could even help out the Rebellion from time to time.”

Given the wide acclaim these ideas found, even Harry’s stubbornness was whittled down eventually, and he conceded to their plans. Accordingly, he soon found himself in the smaller landspeeder, Mercer said it was an X-34, that had been hidden behind the larger truck, and was being shown how to control the thing. As it turned out, it was not all that hard a thing to do, and the older man soon had him slowly manoeuvre the fast and nimble craft out of the hidden ‘garage entrance’ to the smugglers’ den.

Hovering as it was about a meter above the ground, the torn-up, unmaintained road was no problem for the vehicle, although Harry kept having to remind himself of that as they drifted through the equally torn-up landscape of Grandine. Quickly they reached the spaceport where, aside from the docking facilities, the only notable Imperial presence could be found. In this case, notable meant that there was a building with the Imperial crest and a single, distracted guard who did not even blink before waving them through.

The picture that the inside of the building painted was not much different. There was a single counter with a single clerk, sitting behind a console, tiredly playing around with a credit chip. The two of them entering jostled the woman out of her stupor, receiving a stare that made Harry think she was torn between happiness at some kind of a distraction from her workday and severe annoyance at actually having to work.

“Hello, Miss,” Mercer greeted the clerk. “My associate here would like to acquire a number of permits. We would be willing to agree to any extra fee that is required to… expedite approval.”

Where before a look of annoyance had rested on the clerk’s face, there was now an acquisitive gleam shining in her eyes.

“Of course, I am delighted to help any Imperial citizen with navigating the bureaucracy,” she said almost pleasantly, though that shimmer of greed was still very much in place.

“Well, a Captain’s license, a Peace-Keeping and a B23-1-14 permit would be a good place to start. A transport license would not hurt, either,” Mercer continued, and by the expression on the woman’s face it was right obvious she was already planning what to do with the money she would earn as a ‘bonus’ from this transaction.

“Ah, forging a life by upholding the law of the Empire, I see, Mr….”

“Dash, Vincent Dash,” Harry replied promptly using the fake name he had thought up; he did not know, why he had picked that particular name, he just knew he liked it. “I’m from Coruscant.”

“Oh, I’m sure you are Mr…. Dash,” the clerk replied with a knowing smile. “Usually, what you described would take weeks, and it would take consultation with the Imperial Bureau of Citizenship. That’s not something you would want, would you?”

“Not particularly. Weeks is just too long a wait,” the wizard admitted.

“Yes, I’m sure it is the waiting time that is the problem,” the corrupt clerk said glibly. “Fortunately, those wait times, as well as any other requirements, can easily be waived for the slight fee of only 20000 credits.”

Harry was just about to balk at the exorbitant cost, but Mercer’s hand on his shoulder stopped him. “That is very fortunate, that you could help us navigate the bureaucracy like that,” the older man said genially. “Come now, Vincent, we should keep this lady no longer than need be and let her take your picture.”

And that was what they did, and the picture was soon followed by a retina scan. However, when he realised there was a field on the license calling for DNA, he got a bit worried. He had absolutely no interest of letting the Empire get a hand on his genetic information as, while he did not know all that much about the topic, he was quite sure the key to his magical abilities was somewhere in his DNA.

“Don’t worry,” Mercer reassured him, “they don’t sequence everything, only a few highly individual parts that allow someone to easily be identified by. Cataloguing every single base for everyone with one of these permits would be too much, even for the Imperial bureaucracy.”

Still, Harry was only mollified when he was allowed to witness his blood sample first be processed and then destroyed. He received some strange looks when he signed with his new fake name using the script he had learned as a child, but wrote it off as inconsequential, and before long, Vincent Dash was licensed to pilot a ship, drive cargo speeder-trucks and claim bounties on the planet-, sector-, regional- and galactic-level.

“We’ll be back later,” Mercer assured the clerk. “And we’ll bring something that will make your superiors very happy with you.

OOOOOOOO


	9. The Problems of Corruption

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: The Star Wars and Harry Potter copyrights lie with their respective owners, should any of them have any problem with my story being shared, I will comply with their wishes and remove it from circulation.  
> Please do not copy this work or any part of it.

“That’s not so bad,” Leia commented, looking at the ‘Peace-Keeping Certificate’ Harry was showing her. “You should have seen my old diplomatic papers. I had them even as a child, because of my father’s status, and the pictures for the last batch were taken when I was twelve. Everyone wanted me to look my best for them, but I had escaped from the preparations and gone running off to the palace gardens. The result was… interesting. As a lesson, my father forced me to keep them on there until I got my senatorial pass.”

Harry could not help but laugh at the image this brought up in his mind. The poised Princess Leia forced to endure the shame of her diplomatic papers showing the pure chaos a rebellious jaunt into nature might evoke. Not that he thought her particularly vain, on the contrary, but it was still a very entertaining prospect.

The two were standing inside the wide cavern that was at the centre of the hidden lair, right next to the large hover-truck, watching as their captives were shuffled into the back of the bulky vehicle by Arden and Mercer. They were all wearing blindfolds in an effort to limit their ability to cause trouble on the way, although Harry was quite sure that the look on the Dathomirian witch’s face would have been enough to dissuade any funny business. She still favoured her right side a bit, but it was clear that his friend would make a speedy and full recovery.

“We’ll just drop these off, then we can pick up the old man and get off this dust-bowl,” Harry observed in relief.

Again, he was placed behind the wheel of a vehicle he had absolutely no familiarity with, and yet again, it was surprisingly easy. Contrary to the landspeeder he had flown earlier, the transport also had a lever to adjust ground clearance, but that was about the only difference. Just as the X-34, there was no gear shift, just a steering wheel and some pedals. That suited him just fine, and he soon had the comparatively cumbersome craft out of the cave and on the cracked road.

“Are they behaving?” Mercer called to the back where Arden was standing guard over their captives.

“So far,” came the almost disappointed answer from the cargo deck. “I still hope one of them will try something.”

Having seen the one she had knocked out emphatically warn the others about her, Harry was highly doubtful of that possibility, and their captives overhearing the very exchange Mercer and Arden were just having probably did little to foster rebelliousness, either.

Despite the transport having less than half the maximum speed of the landspeeder, they reached the spaceport, and by extension the Imperial administration building, quite quickly. Indeed, they were quick enough that it was still the same, distracted guard standing outside the door. Eventually, though, even someone as disinterested as this guy could not overlook the procession of blind-folded, cuffed people being led his way.

“Halt,” he called. “What is the meaning of this?”

For the first time, Harry pulled out his new bounty hunting certificate. “I’m here to claim the bounty for these six,” he explained casually, trying to give off an air of confidence instead of the gnawing anxiety he actually felt. “One of them goes by ‘the Lizard’.”

Although seeing the man’s eyes widen was somewhat gratifying, the wizard failed to comprehend why the local garrison had never done anything before. He could only guess that it was a mixture of what Mercer had said that the man simply was not enough of a nuisance for the Empire to care and doing the same they had done earlier. Some good, old-fashioned bribery.

“Right through here then, hunter,” the soldier said, pointing to the door. It was telling he did not remember Harry’s earlier visit.

The clerk, too, made googly eyes at the procession that entered her workspace, doubly so as they removed the blindfolds from the faces of the wanted men and it became clear that, indeed, one of them was ‘the Lizard’.

“We’ll take cash or a credit chip, whatever is easier.”

OOOOOOOO

The group of bounty hunters had just left the administrative building, when the clerk they had handed their prise over to was already on a secure holo-com.

“Hello Maxwell,” she greeted the man wearing an officer’s uniform on the other end of the call. “How are you?”

“Splendid, Amira,” he replied, his smile looking rather strained. “I take it this is not a social call?”

Oh, how she loathed this man; and it was reciprocated, as well. Still, for years they had had a very lucrative partnership. “Well, it was not for your uplifting company, as much is sure. I’ve got a target for you.”

Maxwell’s eyes glittered at the news. “Tell me,” he demanded greedily.

“Slow down, Maxwell. 20% for me, as always,” Amira prefaced, to annoyed nodding on the other end of the call. “I just had a group of bounty hunters here; they took out Lizard and delivered him to me with five of his goons. Best thing, they did not exist until this morning. Didn’t seem like the type to stay on Grandine for too long, either. Far as I can tell there are four of them on one of those Pacifier scouts.”

“I’ll let you know how it went,” the ship captain assured the clerk with a malicious grin.

OOOOOOOO

“15000 credits, as promised,” Leia indicated the stack of currency on the _Morningstar’s_ lounge table. “Now get going.”

“Already on my way, Princess,” Solo assured. “Chewie warm up the _Falcon_ , I’ll get our guests off the ship.”

The Hagrid-sized walking carpet behind him replied with a small roar that the smuggler actually seemed to understand and turned around and left Harry’s ship, somehow managing not to dent his head on the various protrusions a being of his size could bump into on the rather compact vessel.

“What’s so damn important about an old man, an annoying boy and two droids anyway,” Solo asked, leaning against the doorframe cockily.

Leia fixed him with a glare. “That’s for me to know and you to guess,” she answered, replacing the glare with a smile that definitely did not reach her eyes.

“Alright, sweetie,” the smuggler acquiesced before turning around and sauntering out of the ship.

“Smug asshole,” the Princess muttered, upper lip curling in distaste as she looked to where Solo had stood seconds earlier. “Are we done with everything?”

“Yes,” Harry replied. “Mercer sold the two speeders, Arden burned the drugs out in the plains and everything worth taking is now in one of the cargo holds. As soon as the general and his sidekick are on board, we can get going. Might get a bit cramped with so many people, but we’ll survive.”

“Good,” Leia commented. “We need to hurry back to the secret Rebel Base; the information stored on those droids is vitally important.”

Harry had thought about the next question he wanted to ask for quite a while, and he was prepared to be rebuffed. “What is that data, anyway?”

Leia sighed deeply and was obviously mulling over whether to tell him. “I suppose you’ve earned the right to know,” she finally conceded. “The plans inside the astromech droid are the detailed schematics of the Empire’s Death Star battle station, the same one you rescued me from. It’s Tarkin’s little pet-project; rule through fear. They’re even calling it the Tarkin Doctrine.”

The whole concept of ruling through fear seemed rather familiar to Harry. “Where I come from, there were many people with abilities similar to mine,” he explained. “Some of them evil. There was one particularly evil guy, called himself Voldemort, who somehow managed to place something called a taboo on his name. That way, when someone said it, they could immediately be found by his henchmen and be made to pay for daring to speak the Dark Lord’s name. It was… depressingly effective.”

“The power of immediate and overwhelming reprisal,” Leia analysed solemnly. “Yes, it sounds somewhat similar. I shudder to think, what the Emperor would do with power like that.”

“Judging from my own experience with a rather persistent dark lord, nothing good.”

OOOOOOOO

“General Kenobi, it warms my heart to see you,” the Princess of Alderaan greeted the old man who had just come up the ramp. “Leia Organa, it is very nice to meet you. Hello, R2, 3PO.”

“An honour to see you too, Princess Leia,” the old general replied solemnly. “My condolences for the fate of Alderaan, and your family.”

Leia nodded sadly, her firm countenance broken at the remembrance of what she had lost. “Your thoughts are appreciated, General Kenobi,” she responded. “Who is your companion?”

The young man, roughly Harry, Arden and Leia’s age if he had to guess, was shaken from the stupor he had been in while staring at the Princess, an action, which had the young wizard unconscionably annoyed.

“Luke… Skywalker,” the young man introduced himself. “Ben is teaching me to become a Jedi.”

Now that was guaranteed to get Harry’s attention; of all the people he had heard about in this reality, the Jedi might have been the ones who knew the most about things like magic. Therefore, he was definitely looking forward to learning more about them.

“Good for you,” Leia answered, although Harry could see that at this point, she was mostly just humouring him; instead, her attention was riveted on the little robot she had called R2 earlier.

“You have the data?”

The little robot… droid, Harry corrected himself beeped in a way that Harry instinctively knew to be something along the lines of a yes.

“R2 wishes to express his offense with even having to be asked that question,” the humanoid, gold-covered robot translated stiffly. “Oh, R2, you are being terribly rude again. What must Master Luke think of you?”

Still bickering, at least that was what it seemed like they were doing, the two droids made off in the direction of the engine room, one rolling along the ground smoothly, the other in his awfully stilted gait. There was a bit of an uncomfortable silence for a while, as the two groups of people stood opposite each other without anyone saying a thing.

Eventually, Harry had enough. “Let me show where you can bunk,” he told the two men and turned around. They followed him to the crew quarters and listened to him explain. “We picked up a few strays along the way, and this was never meant to be a transport ship, so we’ll have to sleep in shifts. The girls have the cabin with the single bed through there, so you can take one of these if you want to catch some sleep.”

The older of the two men inclined his head thankfully. “Thank you for your hospitality, young man. Might I know your name?”

“Of course. I am Harry Potter, but the Empire knows me as Vincent Dash, so should we get into the situation of interacting with anyone outside of the crew, that will be the name I respond to,” Harry introduced himself. “On the _Morningstar_ , Harry is perfectly acceptable.”

“Then thank you, Harry,” the general continued. Harry liked him well enough already, feeling reminded of a somewhat less batty and controlling Dumbledore. “Is there a place on the ship, where we could be allowed to train?”

“What kind of training?” the… well, he was the ship’s captain, now, inquired suspiciously. “Things are rather tightly packed, right now.”

“Oh, nothing dangerous,” Kenobi assured quickly. “Just some light-sabre training, nothing serious.”

Although he thought his estimates might have been off a bit due to a lack of knowledge, that particular description did not sound comforting; definitely not not dangerous.

“They have a training setting, nothing will be damaged,” the older man continued his reassurances.

“I suppose you can use the engine room, then,” Harry allowed. “Just be careful with the equipment in there.”

“We will. Thank you, once again.” With that, the general left, presumably to set up the training he had been talking about, and Harry was left alone with Luke.

“Sooo…” the young man began. “You have your own ship. I bet you must have had some great adventures.”

The longing in Luke’s voice was unmistakeable, and not all that surprising. As far as he had heard, the place he had grown up in was around as interesting and hospitable as the planet they were now rushing to leave behind.

“I only just got the _Morningstar_ ,” he admitted, leaning against the wall. “But I’ve had my fair share of adventures before. It’s never what people make it out to be. Most of the time you’re scared out of your mind, and often it will be luck that saves your arse.”

It was rather obvious that Luke had not expected that answer.

“But isn’t it incredibly exciting?” the young man asked, although his boisterous mood was somewhat lessened. “Flying around, exploring the galaxy.”

Harry chuckled. “I suppose it is,” he admitted readily. “But if what I have experienced up until now were adventures, then I want nothing to do with them. I’d much rather be prepared for the future than stumbling headlong into it.”

And he had actually meant what he said, and very much so. Still, deep inside, he knew that was a luxury he would probably be chasing for a long time.

OOOOOOOO

The entire group of eight humans and two droids had gathered in the bridge of the now much smaller seeming ship and were watching the planet glide away underneath them. Rapidly, first the spaceport itself and then the landmass on which it sat were getting smaller and smaller, as was the bad feeling Harry had had. Somehow, his ‘adventures’ were never this easy. He was just about to celebrate this whole affair as a lucky outlier, when a light on the comms console began blinking.

 _“Scout ship, this is the Corvette_ Reaper _,”_ a male voice said on the other end of the call. _“We suspect you are transporting contraband. You are to subject yourself to an inspection. Prepare to be boarded.”_

Harry threw an alarmed look at Mercer, who was watching the emptiness of space around them shrewdly.

“They must have been forewarned,” he theorised. “If this were a true Imperial action, they would know this was a stolen ship; I bet that clerk wanted in on the bounty we scored and called in some help.”

“That’s all very interesting,” Leia interjected, “but how does it help us?”

The deserter smiled wickedly in reply. “It allows us,” he explained, “to do most anything to this ship. They will be very reluctant to report any of this, for fear of losing their side-business. Now listen closely.”

OOOOOOOO

From beyond visual range, the sleek, dagger-shaped form of the corvette _Reaper_ was quickly closing in upon receiving word that they would be allowed to board. Closely following were two TIE fighters, the very same whose annoying noise Harry had already made out on Dathomir.

As for the _Morningstar_ , it simply hovered in the emptiness of space, not much more than the Life Support Systems still running. Of course, that outward appearance of calm was sharply contrasted by the flurry of activity inside the ship. Everywhere, people were preparing for the plan Mercer had thought up. As the enemy corvette was closing in on the dorsal docking collar, their trap was sprung.

With a hard bank on the flight stick, the nose of the _Morningstar_ was suddenly pointing directly at their target. A simple push on the triggers installed into that very same flight stick and the proton torpedo launcher installed right under the bridge spewed its deadly payload directly into the unprotected belly of the _Reaper_. Not to be outdone, the two turrets now manned by Harry and Arden started spitting out their defiance as well, continuing to hit the already wounded vessel.

As per their plan, Mercer quickly started banking away from their stricken enemy, while Harry and Arden rotated their turrets to the back; even as they were beginning to speed away in the rear of the corvette where none of its gun emplacements could fire, the two gunners let loose a blistering barrage of laser fire, causing the engines to first flicker, then gutter out.

In the cockpit, having plotted in a course of the autopilot, Mercer was busying himself with the comms console.

“Hello, corvette _Reaper_ , can you hear me?”

 _“I will make you pay for this, you piece of scum,”_ came the rather inarticulate reply from the other side of the connection.

“Tut tut tut,” the deserter complained. “Let’s try this again, shall we. I have an amazing offer for you that you would do well to accept; I think it would be rather embarrassing for you to have to tell the brass that your shiny new corvette was disabled by a single scout ship, right? So, I think we can agree that you, while valiantly pursuing a smuggler you had intel was running spice, were brutally ambushed by some marauding pirates.”

 _“I’m listening…”_ the enemy captain grumbled in response.

“With the last bit of power, you could wrangle from your damaged ship, you managed to strike at their command ship, forcing them to flee,” Mercer elaborated. “You can have all that, and as a bonus we will neither tell anyone about that very lucrative thing you and your colleague from the admin building are running here, nor will we upload the holo-vid we just took of our little… shall we say, disagreement.”

_“Done.”_

And the connection broke off.

OOOOOOOO

Outside the cockpit, the shimmering tunnel that was hyperspace was flowing by. Harry was sitting in the pilot’s chair, with Mercer in the co-pilot’s, and being shown how to fly his ship.

“That’s actually not all that hard,” he marvelled, staring at the flight-stick. “It just goes where I point it at with the thrust, I set on the lever.”

“Yeah, well this is an easy ship to fly,” Leia interceded as she watched them from the entryway. “I’m sure when we reach Yavin we can find something harder for you to try out.”

Harry snorted. “I think I’ll be fine,” he responded. “Get a feeling for flying the easy thing, then maybe I will try my hand on something harder. Also, I don’t really think the best place for me is space combat; can’t really use my abilities from behind a canopy.”

“Sounds reasonable enough,” Leia conceded, while Mercer was beating a hasty retreat, throwing Harry a sly grin. “Would you tell me a bit more about yourself? Where you’re from?”

“Sure,” he allowed, although he felt a good deal of trepidation. “Can’t promise you’ll believe me, though.”

And from then on, until deep into the night, Harry told the fascinated, if somewhat doubtful Leia the story of his life.

OOOOOOOO

Beyond the transparisteel canopy of the bridge, the majestic orange swirls of the planet Yavin were concealing the violent nature of the storms they were in actuality; but with the luxury of distance, winds that would have the ability to swat the _Morningstar_ out of the sky like it was some annoying little insect were mere pieces of some elaborate, celestial art object. Naturally, Harry did not pay it much attention, given that he was currently riveted to the controls of his starship.

“Ease up on her a little, Boss,” Mercer instructed from the co-pilot’s seat. “Cramping up will either have you react too slowly or make you skittish and pull around the rudder wildly. Just take a deep breath and relax.”

Harry did as instructed, and for a mere moment, he felt reminded of another way he had flown before: sitting on the old school-broom, feeling the wind in his hair, whistling around his ears. Of course, there was no wind in the vacuum of space, but the memory helped him relax his grip on the flight stick.

“Good, that’s the stuff,” Mercer praised flamboyantly. “We’re going to make a pilot of you, yet.”

Throwing his instructor a wicked glance, the young wizard retightened his grip on the controls and threw the _Morningstar_ into the kind of dive he had used in catching Neville’s Remembrall. It became clear rather quickly that, despite its small size and great manoeuvrability, the ship’s inertial dampening devices were not meant to be taxed like this, and while he was only somewhat jostled in his seat, a thump and indignant cry from the direction of the quarters told a story of interrupted sleep.

Within short order, Harry had just resumed their original heading, a rather indignant Arden could be seen stomping into the cockpit, quickly followed by the ecstatic Luke Skywalker.

“You’re trying out some flying?” he asked excitedly. “Can I try?”

“Sorry,” the captain apologised to both of them. “I guess we just found out why even the seats in the lounge have seatbelts, and we don’t have enough for everyone to stay safe if we pull any crazy manoeuvres. I am used to flying something much… smaller, and with less acceleration.”

“Well, at least we know we have a gifted pilot amongst our little crew, Boss,” Mercer commented wryly, winking at the still very much disgruntled Dathomirian witch whose sleep Harry had disturbed. Still, the crestfallen expression on Luke’s face made it impossible for Harry to deny him even the tiniest bit of flight-time.

“Ah, go on, Skywalker,” he decided. “You can take the co-pilot’s chair and do some flying. Just, no crazy manoeuvres, alright?”

The boy from Tatooine nodded eagerly, and quickly replaced Mercer at his spot

“So, ever flown a starship before?” Harry asked, even though he already suspected the answer; if even half of what he had heard about the man’s home planet was true, then the only reason for staying would be the lack of access to a way off-world. And indeed, the other man shook his head.

“It’s actually not all that different from flying a speeder. You still have throttle control, as well as attitude control,” he explained, repeating the same talk Mercer had given him just an hour ago. “The big difference lies in how many axes you have available. You following so far?”

“Yeah,” Luke responded, even though his eyes were firmly riveted on the flight stick.

“Most basically, you have yaw, which would be the equivalent of your speeder’s steering wheel, as well as pitch, pushing the nose up or down, and roll. That last one should be self-explanatory,” Harry went on with his explanation. “Then you can strafe using the manoeuvring thrusters; not as powerful as the main engine block, but allows you to steer very precisely, if say you want to land on a small landing platform. Do you want to try?”

Luke looked at his ‘teacher’ for a moment as if he was daft before replying. “Of course.”

“I thought so,” Harry chuckled. “Just keep heading into the same general direction and keep away from that gas giant.”

The farm boy eagerly went to work on the controls and was soon banking around the _Morningstar_ from port to starboard and back, careful not to exceed the limits of what the inertial dampeners could compensate.

“You know, I was joking when I said earlier that we should put you into something more challenging to fly,” the amused voice of Leia Organa resonated from the entrance to the cockpit, “but seeing this, I might have to rethink that.”

Harry threw her a wide smile in response. “Sorry, I was serious about what I said, too,” he replied apologetically. “Whether as a bounty hunter with an honour code, or an ally of your Rebel Alliance, I will always be more valuable as a specialised asset where I can bring my talents to bear; that is not in space combat. Though I plan to teach Arden at some point, as of this moment, I am the only one who can do, what I can, and it doesn’t make me more likely to survive a dogfight.”

The Princess returned his smile with equal intensity. “I happen to agree,” she said, matter-of-factly. “Still, I would like to see what each of you can do behind the flight stick of an X-wing.”

As Luke’s eagerness in that regard was of little question, even while he was still concentrating on the ship he was currently flying, it was Harry who rotated his chair.

“I would like to try,” the young, possibly somewhat smitten wizard replied. “It would be awful to disappoint you on this.”

Before Leia had a chance to answer, the light on the console that indicated someone was trying to contact them started blinking.

“Honestly, this keeps happening,” the young woman complained, although there was little bite to it. For there, beyond the cockpit canopy that had only a short time earlier been filled with the orange and brown of Yavin, was now a much smaller, green moon.

Noticing the oddly-conflicted look Harry was giving her, she questioned, “What? Is there something wrong with my hair? Do I have military ration around my mouth?”

“No, no,” he rushed to reassure her. “What you just said only reminded me of someone back home.”

Unwilling to go into further detail in front of Luke, Harry returned his attention to the instruments in the cockpit; specifically, the comms console. Trying to remember the steps Mercer had shown him earlier, he accepted the call.

 _“Unidentified ship, this is Massassi Station. You’re entering restricted space; please state your name and intent,”_ the stiff voice of someone quite audibly steeped in protocol echoed through the connection. Despite the uninviting welcome it provided, it probably made sense.

“Hello Massassi Station, this is the _Morningstar_ ,” the captain replied. “If you would be willing to allow a visual connection, I believe you will be happy to see who we are bringing with us.”

 _“I will have to clear that with my commander,”_ stiff-voice responded. _“Hold position and be advised that any movement will be seen as a hostile act and be reacted to accordingly.”_

“We’ll hold position, Massassi Station,” Harry affirmed; he was not eager to test his newfound flying skills against the Rebels.

A few minutes passed until, once again, a voice could be heard across the connection. _“This is Commander Willard, identify yourself,”_ a much gruffer, but also much less obstinate-sounding man demanded.

“As I said, this is the _Morningstar_. I am Captain Dash, and I have with me Princess Leia Organa of Alder…” he was interrupted in his reply by the connection suddenly opening to a visual level.

“Hello, Commander Willard,” the Princess greeted the greying man now visible on a view-screen to the side of the cockpit. “It is good to see you well.”

Even while she was talking, Harry could see Leia assume what he had come to dub her ‘public persona’; she seemed more poised, less prone to the occasional bout of silliness like this.

“You’re safe! We’d feared you lost when we heard of Alderaan’s destruction.” He seemed somewhat flustered. “You have landing permission, of course.”

OOOOOOOO


	10. New Allies?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: The Star Wars and Harry Potter copyrights lie with their respective owners, should any of them have any problem with my story being shared, I will comply with their wishes and remove it from circulation.  
> Please do not copy this work or any part of it.

Just from the view during their approach, Harry could almost feel how ancient the site where the Rebels had made a home for themselves, was. The high pyramid-like building, despite how monumental it might be, even when viewed from high up, had been completely overwhelmed by the jungles of Yavin 4, save for a small strip of ground where the encroaching green had been rebuffed. Yet, he could still see vines creeping their way back onto the clearing that had most probably been painstakingly created, wrested from the dense forest.

That clearing was also his target.

“Massassi Station, this is the _Morningstar_. Do you have a landing spot picked out for us?” the freshly-minted pilot asked the person on the other end of the line.

 _“_ Morningstar _, just through the blast door and follow the signals of the ground crew,”_ the voice replied. Stiff-guy was back, it seemed.

“Will do,” Harry affirmed, now that he was getting rather eager to see more of this fascinating place; it reminded him of the pyramids the Inca (or was it the Maya? Maybe both?) had built, and he was almost desperate to know how it would look like on the inside.

“Luke are you watching?” he asked his ‘pupil’, who, just like Harry himself, seemed to be captivated by the great temple. “Now, as I’m neither an experienced pilot nor all that familiar with this ship, this is a great time for manoeuvring thrusters. I’ll pull back on the main engine as soon as we come close to the hangar entrance, then I can use these controls to bring us in.”

They soon hovered through the yawning chasm that was the open blast doors at the ground level of the great pyramid, and Harry could not help the feeling of being swallowed by an ancient beast. Inside the base, there was plenty of traffic going on, with throngs of people moving about, decked out invariably in some kind of different uniforms; some were rather more colourful than he thought was tactically advantageous. Then again, neither were the shiny white armours of the Imperial Stormtroopers. He just hoped these were not dedicated combat personnel.

In the back of the large hangar space, he could see a ground crewman (or woman, hard to tell from the distance) was signalling for him to come closer with the glowing cones he held in his hands. Harry was just to about to get really worried about flattening that unflinchingly brave person, when they finally spread their arms to indicate for him to stop and set down. Feeling inordinately relieved at not destroying anything during his first landing, the captain slowly lowered the intensity of the repulsorlifts until they gently set down on the concrete floor.

As the group, Leia and Harry in the lead, made their way down the lowered ramp, they were quickly accosted by a large gathering of people; some of them adorned in the brightly-coloured uniforms he had seen during his approach, others in more understated khakis and olives. However, all of them seemed invariably very happy to see them, or more specifically Leia.

Chief amongst them was the man they had been talking with over the comms connection; not the stiff one, the happy one. Without much of a warning, the Rebel leader rushed in to smother the Princess in a warm embrace.

“You’re safe! We’d feared you lost together with Alderaan,” Commander Willard enthused, before quickly remembering his position and their audience and abruptly composing himself.

“No, though I was there to witness the Empire’s cruelty first-hand while being kept prisoner on their battle station,” Leia explained morosely. “Nevertheless, we managed to secure the schematics to their weapon of terror, though I fear any direct assault would prove fruitless.”

At the mention the plans, a surprisingly smug-looking R2-D2 rolled forward (Harry had no idea, how a droid could look smug, but this one did) and presented itself to the gathered crowd.

“I entered the plans into the data matrix of this astromech, so the technicians should be able to get a readout,” she continued, watching on as the R2 unit was hoisted into the air surprisingly reverently.

“So, you were a prisoner of Tarkin’s?” another white-haired man, this one with a beard, wearing the same khaki-coloured uniform the commander did, inquired. “How did you manage to escape?”

“I did not escape, General Dodonna,” Leia clarified, as she took a step away from Harry and his crew. “These brave souls freed me. Not because of any hopes of a reward, but just because it was the right thing. We stole the ship you see before you now, and it got us here.”

The man called General Dodonna bowed at the hip in the direction of the crew, the captain of which was getting increasingly uncomfortable with the attention all these people were paying him.

“Then you, Captain Potter, and your crew, have our gratitude. It would have hit all of us, had the Princess been lost,” he conveyed his sincerity. “Might we be able to convince you to join us more permanently, now that you have made enemies of the Empire?”

Leia cleared her throat at hearing that. “General Dodonna, this is hardly the place for such a discussion,” she insisted, glancing at the gathered personnel. “Perhaps we can retire to a more private area and give the technicians and analysts the time to go through the schematics we have managed to acquire?”

As she had suggested, so it happened, and it was amusing to see how willingly this group of experience men followed the softly worded reprimands of such a young woman. To a bank of lifts, they were led, which they took to the third level of the old temple, where they were soon ensconced inside a rather cramped briefing room.

“Sorry for that, General Dodonna,” Leia apologised. “The truth of Captain Potter’s existence must never reach the Empire, and as much as I trust every person in this base, the Emperor’s interrogators are also relentless, as I’ve had to find out.”

“Of course, absolutely correct,” the general acquiesced. “I was just swept up in the euphoria of seeing you alive and well. Shall we get through introductions, then?”

“It would be my pleasure. Luke Skywalker and Jedi Master and General of the Grand Army of the Republic, Obi-Wan Kenobi,” she first introduced the two men, one of them standing there, dignified, while the other was still reeling in fascination at the base.

“So, there are yet surviving Jedi,” Willard marvelled. “I had thought them all lost during the purge.”

Kenobi nodded gravely. “There are still some, although I am only sure of one other,” he clarified. “I have found that young Skywalker here has a strong connection to the Force and agreed to train him.”

“Can I learn to fly one of those X-wings?” Luke interceded at that point. “Leia said I could try…”

Dodonna breathed in sharply, then relaxed his posture again. “Well, you’re already as eager as any fighter pilot,” the general replied. “We can arrange for you to try out in a simulator.”

Somewhat mollified by that idea, Luke fell silent again, although he resumed looking around fascinatedly, while also visibly taking in as much of what was being said as was humanly possible.

“Finally, these are Captain Harry Potter, and his crew; Arden Tla of Dathomir, and the former Imperial Navy Lieutenant Mercer Fenwick,” Leia continued the introductions, pointing at each of the three in return. “As well as former members of the Imperial Army Javoc Perdiv and Corsek Betsby.”

A good deal of unease seemed to be going around the room as the Rebel leaders realised how many of their guests were former Imperials, but luckily, Leia would not have it. “Gentlemen, please. Most of you are defectors, just like these three,” she chided gently. “Give them the same chance the Rebellion gave you. They all joined the military with the best of intentions and eventually became disgusted by what they were expected to do, like so many of us.”

After that, the meeting dissolve into a long-winded description of first Harry and Arden’s flight off of Dathomir, although he was explained away as a stranded member of a sect of unique Force-users, their arrival on the Death Star, how they had found Mercer and prevented him from doing something supremely stupid and, eventually, how they had stumbled upon Leia.

“I’m sorry, are you saying you took the contents of an entire Imperial armoury?” interjected the clearly disbelieving Commander Willard. “If so, I know our quartermaster would be very interested.”

This time, it was neither Harry nor Leia who answered; instead, it was Mercer who spoke up, as he shot Harry a glance that said, ‘let me handle this,’ and got a nod in return.

“And we would love to share,” he began, though the upcoming but was quite predictable. “But we also have to think of the _Morningstar_ and her crew. It’s not credits we want, but services. I assume you have slicers and engineers?”

“Yes, we do,” Dodonna conceded. “You want to barter, correct?”

“Correct, old boy. A company’s worth of military-grade weapons, along with several pieces of officer armour and ten full suits of stormtrooper armour,” Harry’s self-appointed barter-master counted what he had available. “In return, your slicers unlock the biometric lock on the remaining ten sets of armour, allowing us to use it, and your engineers work on the _Morningstar_ to allow us to switch transponder codes. Oh, and we need another cot; there are only four at the moment, and there’s five of us.”

OOOOOOOO

Harry was watching silently as people milled around his ship, both loading and unloading things, although the amount of stuff coming out vastly surpassed what was going in. In all honesty, he felt at a bit of a loose end. While Javoc, whose training as an Army technician was the closest they had to a starship engineer, was overseeing work on the _Morningstar’s_ transponder and Arden had decided to drop in on Luke’s training with Kenobi, there was very little for him to do.

As he was daydreaming, he was suddenly tipped on the shoulder rather forcefully and, after only jumping out of his skin a tiny little bit, turned around to find Mercer grinning at him.

“Hey boss,” the man greeted. “Fancy meeting you here; those Rebel techs really know their stuff and are already done with the first ten suits of armour. Thought maybe you’d want a hand in redesigning them a bit. Wouldn’t want to look like bucketheads, would we?”

The young wizard snorted at the description, as much as he agreed with the content of what had been said.

“Sure, lead the way,” he agreed, quickly following after the already moving deserter. “What did you have in mind?”

“We have two sets,” Mercer commented enthusiastically. “I was thinking, two vastly different designs, five suits of armour each. That way, we can make one as intimidating as possible, use that when we’re hunting a bounty, and the other could have the Rebel symbol on it somewhere. That way, if we fight alongside their people, we won’t be shot at, which I count as a definite plus. Dodonna already allowed that.”

They were moving past the lifts now, yet Mercer was still talking with as much fervour as he had started with. “First, I thought maybe a kama, a kind of skirt to protect us from shrapnel and such, might be a good idea, but that’s a Mandalorian thing, and might piss them off, should we run into any. You don’t want to piss off the Mandalorians if you can prevent it,” he narrated, until they finally reached a door that he led Harry through.

“Eventually, I thought, why not do something that would allow us to hide our armour completely. Now, the standard stormtrooper armour is too bulky for that, but then I remembered, you could do this trans… what was it?”

“Transfiguration,” Harry finished. “So, you want me to reform the armour, somehow? Won’t that destroy some of the extra features you said it had?”

“Ah, now that is where the armourer of our new friends at the Rebellion comes in,” Mercer explained, pointing at the man working on a workbench inside the room they had just entered. “He’s willing to help us with stripping the components out of the helmets and then put them back in as soon as you’ve shaped them the way we want.”

Harry looked at the two smiling men, excited like children in the face of doing something that had never been done before.

“I’ll give it a try,” the wizard acquiesced. “Do you have something disposable for me to practice on?”

OOOOOOOO

“They were not exaggerating about a company’s worth of weapons,” Willard whispered sharply, insistently looking at Dodonna. “They did all that, without back-up, without prior intelligence. Think of what they could do with the right resources.”

“Still, you’re talking about giving Alliance resources into the hands of a complete unknown,” the old general cautioned. “And I don’t believe for a second that story about this Harry, was complete. Yes, the Princess seems to know, but she also does not seem to be objective in this.”

“Oh, please, you know me better than that, Jan. I was not thinking of giving him command of a squadron, or anything the like,” the un-bearded man exclaimed. Well, as much as exclamation was possible while still whispering. “Just some intel that might lead into mutually beneficial situations, maybe allow them use of our safe-houses and repair yards.”

Dodonna mulled that over for a while, worrying his lips in deep thought. “I’d still like to see how they play with a larger team,” he mused. “What did Vernan say about that shipyard operation? The intel is good, but Cracken’s infiltrators are busy elsewhere, right?”

OOOOOOOO

Inside a hidden hangar on Yavin 4, on the ground under the parked shape of his ship, Harry Potter was in a duel. More of a contest, really.

He was in a staring contest with a singed piece of plasteel.

It had quite obviously once been part of a stormtrooper’s armour, until the soldier wearing it had been felled by the shot that had left its mark on the shoulder plate. Taking a deep breath, Harry closed his eyes to centre himself once again and think of the general principles guiding transfiguration.

The larger the change, the more skill and energy it takes.

Every increase in mass takes more energy.

If you want it to be permanent, you better plan on burning through a lot of your reserves.

There were of course simple spells, mostly used to teach beginners the groundwork, that managed to circumvent these conventions, simply because they were specifically designed for what they did, and the change was always concentrated on one particular aspect; porcupine to pincushion, match to needle, that kind of stuff.

As much as he had hated it earlier in his life, now he was wishing he had the ability to ask a few more questions of Professor McGonagall, as hard as explaining why he was asking these things might seem. That was when it hit him: he had a whole host of older, more experienced wizards right in his head, their memories just waiting to be used. Surprisingly, his new reality had somehow managed to keep him so busy that he had simply forgotten about that particular development his unplanned new lease on life had brought.

Determined, now, to find a solution, Harry delved into the hundreds, neigh thousands of years of memories that he would probably never manage to fully experience and could only learn about by reliving it alongside its originators, until he found what he was looking for.

He had been a blacksmith and artificer, sometimes jeweller, whose art had been sought near and far. Little did the superstitious people paying exorbitant sums for his craft know that they were patronising a man that, had they known about his secret, they would have tried to burn. Of particular comedic value had been the case of an inquisitor, a man who prided himself on sussing out sorcerers and apostates wherever they were, who happened to commission a silver cross. Obviously, the commission had been fulfilled, for the skilled smith had little interest in attracting the wrath of the ‘Holy Inquisition’, but he had added a little extra.

From that day onward, the inquisitor would regularly have to live through some of the worst diarrhoea imaginable.

Interesting, and entertaining as well, as that story had been, Harry was even more fascinated with how his ancestor had manipulated the form of his pieces of art by thought and wand alone. Indeed, he would always use as much raw material as was needed for his projects and would then simply rearrange the shape, allowing him to make the transfigurations permanent without much effort. The only thing that was absolutely necessary was a firm picture in the caster’s mind of what exactly was to be formed.

Satisfied that he had a way of doing what he wanted to, Harry opened his eyes again to resume his staring contest with the singed shoulder plate.

OOOOOOOO

“How long has he been sitting there?”

“No idea.”

“Is he asleep?”

“Maybe we should try waking him up.”

“You know I can hear you, right?” Harry interjected. “And I’d really like to concentrate.”

The voices of Arden and Leia fell silent, while the young wizard resumed staring at the piece of armour in front of him. He had thought long and hard about how to achieve what he wanted and had come to the conclusion that his smith ancestor’s way was the one that would most likely lead to the kind of success.

“Alloios!” he commanded firmly, the new shape he wanted for the armour firmly in his mind, while also imagining the burn residue in a separate, small ball.

To his everlasting surprise, plasteel was a very different material than silver, gold and iron, after all, what he had imagined for his product was actually what he got. Where before there had been a singed shoulder plate now lay a small model of a phoenix, as pristinely white as a fresh piece of stormtrooper armour, the black residue of a blaster-burn scattered beside it where the small sphere he had formed it to fell to the ground.

“Awesome,” he exclaimed, holding up the very solid piece of former armour. A spring in his step, the young wizard arose and sauntered over to the two women who had interrupted him only moments earlier.

“I managed to reshape the plate into this,” he held up the phoenix statue as proof. “If Mercer has the designs ready and the others agree, I should be able to make us some great armour.”

The two looked at the piece of plasteel in fascination. “What is that?” Leia finally managed to ask, tearing her eyes away from the intricate swing of the bird’s wings and delicate features of its feathers. “I have never seen such a being before…”

“Where I come from, we call it a phoenix. It’s a symbol of hope and purity of intent,” he explained, thinking fondly of Fawkes and his soothing song. “When they die, they go up in flames and are reborn from the ashes.”

Looking into the faces of the two women, Harry was struck by how silent they had become. And while Arden was simply smirking a little, her gaze alternating between the other two, Leia seemed to have been affected rather profoundly.

“The phoenix is the symbol of the Rebellion,” she finally whispered. “A way to honour the memory of a man who died to bring it about.” She pointed toward the red symbols visible throughout the Rebel base, which Harry had only taken in passingly, before.

“Yeah, it does look a bit like a phoenix,” he admitted, then turned back to Leia with a smile. “Here, you take it. Take it to remember that, as dark as things may be at times, they will get better.”

The orphan Princess of Alderaan took the little statue almost reverently, and before Harry could say any more, she quickly turned around and fled toward the lifts. He was just about to follow, when a hand on his shoulder held him back.

“Trust me, she wants to be alone right now,” Arden advised emphatically. “Leia has to appear strong at all times, and she will want to do things on her own terms, right now. If you want to do something, go meet Mercer and the two of you can play with your toys.”

As much as it pained him to do so, Harry had to admit she was right. He had been in similar moods before, and he had always needed some time on his own before he could let someone drag him out of his dark hole. Instead, he went to look for Mercer.

Unsurprisingly, he found the former Imperial still in energetic conversation with the Rebels’ armourer/quartermaster, both of them bowed deeply over a set of schematics they were obviously working on.

“Ah, Harry, fancy seeing you here,” his crewmember greeted jovially. “Tell me, did it work?”

Rather proud of himself for adapting his ancestor’s tricks for his own use, Harry nodded. “Excellent,” the older man exclaimed, holding out the datapad he and the quartermaster had been looking at.

“Merlin, that looks scary,” the wizard commented after catching himself in being quite shaken by the new aesthetic Mercer was going for.

“That’s why you can take off the mask,” the Rebel offered. “But we figured, if the Imps can use psychological warfare, so can we. You didn’t think it was an accident the stormtrooper helmets look like skulls, did you?”

“Haven’t really thought about it,” Harry admitted. “So, you want me to make this? Do we have enough material? Otherwise it will leave me incredibly tired.”

“We should have enough,” Mercer confirmed. “Since we’re not mass-producing the stuff, I could take individual measurements for everyone, and we can build the breastplate out of more interlocked parts. Should make movement that much easier.”

“Also, Ethkay here said he’ll allow us to use some of his stock if we make him a suit too,” he lowered his voice conspiratorially. “We’ll have all of the standard features of stormtrooper armour, plus a built-in rebreather.”

Leaning into the huddle, a grinning Harry finally, if rather silently, proclaimed, “Let’s get started then.”

OOOOOOOO

Eleven suits of former stormtrooper armour being transfigured later, Harry was completely wiped out. Despite his earlier cockiness, permanently reforming not only the plasteel, but also the magnetic insulation inside the helmets, had taken a lot out of him. Heedlessly, the young wizard stumbled into the thankfully dark room on his ship that contained the single bed.

Only problem, as he let himself fall onto the surprisingly comfortable mattress, there already was a warm body occupying the space. A small shriek of surprise, and some indignation, told him that it was Leia.

As he activated the lights to apologise profoundly, he was stricken by how worn-out and sad the normally vivacious young woman looked. Quickly, he dimmed the lights so she might feel a bit more comfortable.

“Sorry,” she mumbled in a small voice. “I wanted to be alone, but also not alone, maybe talk to you, but everyone kept coming into my room, so I hid here.”

Seeing Leia like this was profoundly unsettling to Harry; there were some tear-streaks on her face and her eyes were red, heavy bags underneath. He was immediately on guard, having a rather mixed history with crying women as he did, and not even having thousands of years of life-experience stuffed into his head was enough to make him feel better about it. That was especially true since he had mostly concentrated on learning and emulating the skills of the people whose lives he remembered and tuned out during the actual ‘living’; anything else would have felt too much like peeping.

Still, he let himself sink down on the bed next to Leia and put an arm around her should that he hoped would be at least somewhat comforting. Apparently, it was, as the distraught newly orphaned girl immediately leaned into the embrace, letting her head rest on Harry’s shoulder. Usually, he often felt small, both in metaphorical, but also quite literal a sense. Neither his father nor his mother had been overly large, yet next to Leia’s petite form he felt almost gigantic.

“I keep thinking that, maybe, if I had just told them where our base was, that just maybe Alderaan would still be there,” she mumbled into Harry’s shoulder, covered in the fabric of his shirt which was now quickly growing wet with warm tears. “Maybe he just didn’t believe me about Dantooine…”

He squeezed the upper arm he held in his hand a little in a gesture of comfort before he responded verbally. “You tried telling Tarkin Dantooine was the secret base?” Leia nodded against his shoulder. “Then why did he destroy Alderaan anyway?”

“He said that Dantooine was too remote to make its destruction notable enough,” she replied silently. “Still, he could have lied to me, right? Never believed me about it in the first place.”

Harry was already shaking his head when he realised, she would not be able to see the gesture. “Remember, he thought you were going to be dead, soon,” he reminded gently. “I can tell you from personal experience that is when the bad guys get overly confident and start spewing truths, they should have kept secret.”

Despite herself, the distraught young woman leaning against his shoulder giggled a bit; it was a tiny sound, but it was there, and it was like a ray of sunshine in her dour mood. Without thinking much of the implications or possible consequences, only aware of how bloody tired he was, Harry began shuffling the two of them back onto the bed until they were both lying there, him using a cushion to prop up his head, and her using him as a cushion.

“What did you tell me about Alderaan? A rebellious planet, deeply committed to democracy, its resistance group one of the founding members of the Alliance,” he went on soothingly. “And the Tarkin Doctrine, rule through fear. Do you really think the Alderaanians would have stopped resisting after the destruction of the Alliance? Because I certainly don’t.”

There was a proud smile on Leila’s face for a second as she thought about the spirit of her people, and she shook her head. As much as that was possible, at least, given her position cuddled up to Harry on a single bed.

“So then, Yavin being in the middle of nowhere, would not have made for a compelling target to instil fear in the more rebellious citizens,” the wizard continued to analyse; he was sadly reminded of another foe using scare-tactics the likes of these. Killing Amelia Bones had served Voldemort well in planting fear inside the minds of the ordinary witch and wizard. “No, at least one important, populous planet would have had to be destroyed. You ask me, Tarkin wanted to destroy Alderaan regardless of what you told him.”

“Sounds reasonable,” the woman cuddled into his shoulder mumbled, although it was no longer a sad, and instead more of an exhausted tone. Moments later, Harry heard the even breathing of sleep, and he tried to extricate himself from her. Yet, at every attempt he made, she would make some forlorn noise and grapple for his arm.

With the eventual acceptance of the fact that he would not get away came the realisation that he did not really want to. And within moments of that realisation came a deep and restful sleep.

OOOOOOOO


	11. Enemy Within

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: The Star Wars and Harry Potter copyrights lie with their respective owners, should any of them have any problem with my story being shared, I will comply with their wishes and remove it from circulation.  
> Please do not copy this work or any part of it.

“I was right, you really are so cute together,” the teasing voice of Arden wafted through Harry’s sleep-addled mind. Immediately, he sat up, arms behind his back as additional support.

Unfortunately, that deprived the young woman who had been using him as a cushion of exactly that; with an indignant yowl, Leia planted face-first into the mattress. Shaking her head to clear the cobwebs, she raised herself on an elbow, only to immediately burrow back into the cushion, the beginnings of an impressive flush on her face and neck.

“Cute,” Arden repeated wryly. “The whole base is in a flurry over where our dear Princess is, but I had a feeling…”

That got Leia’s attention better than anything else could have. “How long have they been looking for me?” she inquired worriedly, still avoiding looking anyone in the eye.

“Around half an hour,” the witch replied. “Dodonna wanted you there for the briefing on the Death Star schematics; you too, ‘Boss’. Or do you prefer Captain, now?”

“Thanks Arden,” ‘Boss’ replied, amusement breaking through the embarrassment. Not that what he and Leia had done was wrong (it felt way too good for it to be wrong), as a matter of fact, it had been totally innocent, but the unplanned nature of it all still left him reeling. Not to mention that Arden would never let him live it down.

“Mercer there already?” he asked, the Dathomirian witch nodding in response. “Alright. I’ll freshen up and go to the command centre.” Once again realising that he was a wizard, Harry took his staff in hand, applied a quick cleaning charm to himself and offered to do the same for Leia, who gladly accepted. It seemed she was reluctant to traverse the entire base, sleep-ruffled, after having been lost.

“Lead the way,” the ‘Boss’ told Arden, who surprisingly shook her head.

“I wasn’t invited. Mercer has inside information, you have special skills. There was no reason for them to include me and let more people know of what they are going to speak than was absolutely necessary,” she explained. “Were I planning something important, I would do the same.”

Still feeling somewhat unsettled about keeping information from people who trusted him to lead them, Harry followed Leia out of the ship and toward the lifts. All of the way, there was an uncomfortable, though not tense silence.

“Sorry I ambushed you like that,” she finally said when they were in the isolated cart. “And just, you know… tearing up on you and then just falling asleep.”

Harry smiled at her weakly. “It’s alright,” he soothed. “I’m not great with crying women, but I’ve survived worse. Also, I slept really well.”

“Me too,” Leia giggled, a flush already creeping back onto her face. “I wish you would stay.”

Her obvious dejection at the thought of him leaving left the young man struck to the heart, and for just a moment, he pondered doing as she wished and become a fully-fledged member of the Rebellion.

“I’m sorry, Leia,” he eventually said with deep sincerity. “I thought I had distanced myself from my former life but being around people again… it brought back a lot of memories. I’ll work with the Rebels if they need me, even if it means sneaking onto the Death Star and blowing the whole thing to smithereens, but I can’t be part of this right now. I have my crew to worry about, as well as you, and that is about as much worrying as I can manage right now.”

The Princess of Alderaan accepted his reasoning with a sad nod. “Will you at least come and visit?”

Not waiting for him to answer, she stood on her tiptoes and pressed a light, fluttering kiss to Harry’s lips.

“Because I’d really like to see you again, and soon.”

“Well now I have to,” Harry joked, although it lacked enthusiasm. “Ask me about it again in a year.”

Leia distanced herself from him, a shimmer of hurt in her eyes. “Ask you about what?” she inquired, and by her tone alone he could tell that a lot was riding on the correct answer to this question.

“Not about visiting, of course,” he assured. “About joining the Alliance. Only if my crew is on board, though.”

OOOOOOOO

There was an impressive gathering of high officers of the Alliance awaiting the quiet pair in the briefing room. Both Dodonna and Willard were there, of course, but there were also two other men present, as well as the life-size holograms of a woman in a flowing white dress, a rugged-looking man with a moustache and greying hair, as well as a squid man.

“Princess, Captain Potter,” Dodonna greeted them as they entered. “May I present Generals Willard, Vernan and Cracken, as well as former senators Garm Bel-Iblis and Mon Mothma, and finally former Admiral Gial Ackbar.”

Harry bowed his head slightly in acknowledgement of the rank of all those assembled before him, before turning his attention onto Willard. “Congratulations on your promotion, General Willard.”

While Leia did likewise, he turned his attention to the holographic presences in the room with them; he could sense a distinct hostility between the two former senators, although for the life of him, he could not figure out the cause for it. The squid man, Ackbar, simply seemed unassuming, barring the fact that he was a squid man.

“I appreciate the invitation,” the former admiral said gruffly, “but I fail to see the reason for my invitation to such a high-profile meeting. I have resigned my Alliance commission to lead the forces of my people.”

“All shall be revealed shortly,” Mothma declared, once again drawing the dirty looks of Bel-Iblis.

“Deigning to inform us, Mon? Maybe power hasn’t gotten to your head as much as I had feared,” he snarked with a distinct accent Harry could not quite place.

“Please, Senators,” Leia interjected soothingly. “Let us not besmirch those we have lost by falling apart at the seams at such crucial a time.”

That brought them up short, and little surprise it was. Having the daughter of Bail Organa remind them of their losses, of which he himself was a recent and costly one, was bound to make an impact.

“Thank you, Princess,” Dodonna said. “Admiral, you were asked to attend because of the danger we face, and because of the kind of that danger, as well as the opportunity that had been handed to us. General Vernan, would you do the honours?”

One of the other two men Harry had not known nodded importantly and stepped forward. “Due to Princess Leia and her new allies, we have in our hands the complete technical readouts of the Emperor’s superweapon, the Death Star,” he explained, and those that had not been previously informed of their acquisition drew sharp breaths. “Everyone here was invited either because they were involved in the retrieval of these plans, or because this weapon might become a danger to them.”

“Senators.” The general had begun pacing around the circular table that was now projecting a hugely zoomed out holo-image of the Death Star. “Two of the three signatory worlds to the Corellian Treaty remain, making them viable targets under Tarkin’s doctrine of fear. I fear, due in part to our actions, Mon Calamari might be considered a target as well. Now, the weapon has two major, exploitable flaws: firstly, there is a thermal exhaust port that a very skilled snub-fighter pilot would be able to attack and hit with an ordinance-based weapon, triggering a reactor detonation. General Dodonna will return to that later.”

Now standing at the far side of the hologram-projecting table, General Verna continued his presentation. “The other weakness lies in their weapon system itself. The superlaser relies on multiple finely calibrated tributary lasers. Should even one of them fail, the main beam will dissipate and backscatter, and if the focusing crystals of even one of the tributary means should be misaligned when they try to fire the weapon, the battle station will tear itself apart.”

The gathered officers pondered the implications of what they had been told for a while, and eventually, it was Ackbar that spoke up first. “Do we know where it is?” he inquired, looking at the construct with trepidation. “And how often do they check the alignment of the focusing crystals?”

“My informants indicate that the Death Star is currently holding position in the Alderaan system,” Cracken informed them. “As for the maintenance intervals on the main weapon, we have no information.”

Seeing the inquisitive look of the Rebel officers, Mercer nodded his head apologetically. “I was stationed nowhere close to anything regarding the superlaser,” he replied to the questing looks. “The entire station was separate from the gunners and maintenance crew for the main weapon. Anyone trying to infiltrate the work-crews would be shot before they can say ‘I’m not a Rebel spy’.”

“I expected as much,” Cracken nodded. “Regardless, all my Infiltrators are either in the field or in deep cover, anyway, so any attempt at an infiltration would have to wait until some of them return from their missions. Generals Dodonna, you have prepared tactical options I believe?”

“Yes,” the bearded officer agreed. “A massive attack employing capital ships, the resources for which we currently don’t have, would be able to target the superlaser in such a way that it would again destroy the station. The only tactical approach we currently have would be to employ small, one-pilot fighters to deliver a payload directly to the exhaust port. Our psychological profile of Gouverneur Tarkin indicates the kind of arrogance that would almost certainly lead him to believe an attack like that to be inconsequential. Even one direct hit would be able to blow up the entire station.”

“Now, wait a minute,” Mercer interjected furiously. “You just want to blow up the whole thing without warning? There are families on there!”

“And what would those families do when our families, our planets were destroyed?” Bel-Iblis retorted. “They would cheer, that’s what. Just because you saw the evil in this abomination does not mean others on it will.”

After that, the whole meeting devolved into a debate on the ethics of destroying a military asset with what Bel-Iblis called ‘deliberately placed human shields’ aboard it; honestly, Harry tuned it out after a while, although the snippets he did consciously hear reminded him of an old quote about ‘one death being a tragedy, a million deaths being a statistic’. Eventually it boiled down to the fact that, during any forced evacuation of the Death Star, the Empire would seize any hint of sentimentality on the side of the Rebellion and probably keep as many children and pregnant women on board; it sounded rather in-character, as far as the Emperor was concerned.

“Captain Potter, do you have anything to add?”

Being spoken to stirred him out of his musings and Harry looked at Dodonna wide-eyed.

“I believe everything has been said,” he ventured, relief filling him when it seemed like the right thing to say.

“I believe you told us you can obscure yourself from optical localisation. Is that true?” the man continued to question. Harry nodded in return, already knowing where this might lead. “Would you be able to do the same to a starfighter?”

It was an idea that had crossed Harry’s mind before. With how close it seemed starships came together during combat, the ability to remain visually undetectable would be a huge tactical boon. Not to mention how easy it would make sneaking up on that exhaust port.

“I believe it would be possible,” he allowed, reluctantly. “I would have to take some time to think about it, and then a working ship to test on. My abilities often interfere with the technology of my home rather violently, so while the basic stuff I’ve done to my and my crew’s blasters seems to work out just fine, I would not want to rely on anything I do in that regard without testing it first.”

“We would be very thankful if you could do that,” Dodonna replied, before adding, “And you will have all the resources you need.”

“This is all purely academical right now,” Bel-Iblis interjected at that. “I don’t discount the worth of this, should it work, but for now, me must all bring up top as much as we can of our starfighters. Tell us about that other mission you were mentioning earlier, Cracken.”

“Right you are,” General Cracken replied, if a bit frostily; it seemed he did not like being spoken to in such a manner. “We have reliable intel on a lightly-guarded Imperial repair yard in the Keldooine system. Most of the local forces have been redistributed to participate in the failed offensive against Nar Shaddaa and the annexation of Sriluur, leaving only token forces behind on the shipping yard. Unfortunately, as I said before, my Infiltrators are unavailable to relieve them of those remaining ships. That’s where Captain Potter and his crew would come in.”

The floating representation of the Death Star was suddenly replaced by a much smaller installation, hovering at the middle of a measly flotilla of warships.

“In expectation of the damaged vessels from the Nar Shaddaa assault, the station is scheduled to receive a military convoy ship, filled to the brim with ship components, including shield generators and reactor parts,” he pointed at the picture of a dagger-shaped craft. “Until it reaches the station, it will have an escort, but as soon as it docks, that escort will leave. I have a few special forces soldiers still available that are not highly trained enough to infiltrate the Death Star, but if we can get them and a few astromechs onto that station, just before we launch a diversionary attack with some of our frigates, we can take not only that shipment, but the two corvettes and the frigate that are scheduled to finish repairs shortly.”

Harry considered the plan for a while and found that he quite liked it. “I assume you want us to sneak those soldiers onto the station?”

“That’s what I had in mind,” Cracken affirmed. “They lack the infiltration skills of my Infiltrators, but with your abilities, that could be circumvented. In return for your help, and aware as we are of the good you are willing to do with it, we would be willing to hand over the Raider-II-Class corvette _Adjudicator_ to you, as well as modify it to your wishes. Now, I believe you’ve done an admirable job of impersonating an ISB officer before?”

OOOOOOOO

Harry was back in one of the rather uncomfortable uniforms worn by all of the Imperial officers; it was cut in a way that made him stand almost uncomfortably straight, and the white uniform top’s association with an organisation as vile as the ISB rankled him deeply. Still, he managed to feel better by reminding himself that he would soon be able to change out of the garment.

“Boss, we’re being hailed,” Mercer interrupted his thoughts. The Imperial deserter, himself wearing one of the white ISB uniforms, was at the helm of the Lambda-class shuttle the Rebels had given them for their covert approach. He, along with Arden and Harry himself had been altered in their appearance by some human transfiguration, making them look older, among other things; the same could not be said about Corsek and Javoc, yet given their disguise as stormtroopers, including helmets covering their entire faces, there was not exactly a problem.

“Reply to the hail. Let’s hope the security codes are accurate,” Harry ordered, looking worriedly at the group of warships guarding the repair-yard.

“Aye-aye,” Mercer nodded before turning his attention back to the communication console. The man’s stoicism in serious situations was still a shock to his captain, given his usually rather laid-back attitude. “Keldooine Base, this is ST-1143. We’re here to commence an inspection. Transmitting codes now.”

_“Acknowledged, ST-1143,”_ the communications officer on the station replied. _“Codes received, proceed to hanger 005.”_

“Acknowledged, Keldooine Base, proceeding to hangar 005, ST-1143 out,” Mercer closed the comm channel down and threw a grin back into the direction of where he knew the Rebel soldiers were waiting, disillusioned. Each of them was equipped with a small, low-frequency transmitter that allowed their comrades to see them but would never be looked for by the Imperial troops.

Harry too turned around and said toward the faint shimmer where he knew the five troop commanders were waiting, “Remember, you have three quarters of an hour until the diversionary attack starts. They will expect their docked military ships to aid in the fight, while the transport will most likely be expected to flee, so you have to be on board by then, ready to act. Now, target allocation?”

“Troop 1, Imperial Cargo Ship _Atlas_ ,” the left-most shimmer reported in. “Docking tube 001.”

“Troop 2, Nebulon-B escort frigate _Vigil_ , docking tube 004.”

“Troop 3, Guardian customs corvette _Interdictor_ , hangar 004.”

“Troop 4, reactor room, place the charges, get back to the shuttle hangar, take the shuttle out of there.”

Satisfied that everyone knew their assigned roles, Harry had insisted on the specific instructions for troop 4 himself, he nodded.

“Then my team and I will confer with the commanding officer, alleging the yard had been compromised by the Hutt cartels and demand to inspect the new Raider-II corvette myself,” he followed up with his part of the plan. “Remember, there won’t be many stormtroopers around, they were all thrown into the Nar Shaddaa assault, but those that are here won’t be affected by the gas. If you see some, you take them out quickly. Troop 5.”

“Yes sir,” the right-most shimmer responded, catching Harry supremely off-guard; never in his life had he expected to be called sir any time soon. “You move directly to hangar 006, take out everyone onboard that corvette, then hide them. Non-lethal, if possible. And remember, when you’ve taken over the ships, no heroics; just fly them out of here, we have no idea what the last thing the Imps haven’t fixed will be.”

“Yes, Sir,” the disillusioned troopers all affirmed their familiarity with their orders. And not a minute too early, as their transport was now inching into the hangar numbered 005, where a contingent of base personnel was already awaiting their arrival.

“Good luck, everyone,” the young wizard told the assembled group of mostly invisible people. Considering he felt way out of his depth, he had handled himself admirably, he thought.

OOOOOOOO

Flanked by his ‘pilot’ (Arden) and his partner in investigating acts of disloyalty all around the Empire (Mercer), escorted by two stormtrooper, ISB colonel Landa (Harry) stepped down the ramp of the Lambda shuttle to where the command staff of the repair yard was waiting; the base commander, a Commander Siddick, was visibly nervous at the sudden visit of such a high-ranked ISB officer.

“Commander Siddick,” Harry greeted dispassionately, even while he was internally freaking out. “The welcome committee was really not necessary.”

“Forgive me, Colonel…” the man replied obsequiously, before turning around to his staff and biting out, “Everyone, dismissed.”

“Colonel Landa,” the faux colonel introduced himself. “Lieutenants Gorsis and Wildow, they will assist me in my inspection. Lead us to your office.”

While he was already moving along the polished ground, the base commander began talking. “I am very sorry, Colonel Landa,” the man huffed, obviously not all that used to the physical exertion of keeping enough of a lead on Harry to be considered to be actually leading them. “Had I known you were coming, I would have prepared in advance…”

“Had you known I was coming, it could hardly be called a surprise inspection, could it, Commander?” the disguised intruder interjected. Seemingly not sure what to make of his guest, Siddick fell silent as he continued leading them to his office.

Said office was a rather utilitarian room with a large transparisteel window overlooking the docking tubes on the inside of the station’s half-circle shape, appointed with a drab, grey desk, behind which sat an office chair and in front of which were two basic seats.

“Stand guard. No one is to disturb us,” Harry ordered the two ‘stormtroopers’ accompanying him, before he and Mercer sat down on the two remaining chairs opposite the commander. “Now, I am sure you must be wondering what brings us all the way out… here,” the disguised wizard said, lacing his speech with all the smug condescension he could muster.

“Yes, Sir, I actually was wondering. We seldom see visitors of your rank out here,” the stomach-churningly servile commander admitted, all the while continuing to butter up this supposed colonel. “By the way, might I interest you in a glass of milk? We get it directly from the planet below.”

“Milk? I am not here to slurp milk, Commander.” Harry’s level of voice had gone dangerously low by then. “I am here due to credible concerns that your operation might have been compromised by the Hutt cartels in an effort to steal the exact schematics of the new Raider-II-class corvettes.”

Siddick’s eyes grew wide in fear, as had been expected. Something like this could, according to Mercer, be both a career- as well as a literal killer.

“Then we will assist you in any possible capacity, sir,” he declared quickly, seemingly very intent to ‘save his own ass’, so to speak.

“I would expect nothing less,” Harry commented dismissively. “Recall all your personnel bar the ones manning turrets, reactors and sensors to their barracks, all the ship crews to their ships. No one is to leave their post, the whole base is under a comms-lockdown. Am I understood?”

The base commander nodded fearfully.

“Very well. We will first inspect storage holds and armoury, then you will lead us to the corvette you have inside your hangar. We have to make sure it has not already been tampered with.”

OOOOOOOO

At the ramp of the shuttle bearing the number ST-1143, a large number of barely visible shapes (along with four much smaller, black astromech droids) were starting to pour down the ramp, as soon as the large overhead speakers were starting to announce the recall and confinement of all non-essential personnel to their quarters. That left few people for the commando troops to dodge as they carefully made their way through the drab corridors of the Imperial installation, splitting up at their assigned intersections.

The first to break off were troops 3 and 5, their targets being in the hangars directly next to the one their shuttle had landed in. Next were troops 1 and 2, headed for the docking tube and the ships connected to the station through them. That only left troop 4, the smallest of the groups attached to this mission.

Through the empty corridors they went, the state of which enforced a grudging respect in the troop leader, a former smuggler by the name of ‘Hound’. At first, he had chafed at being put under the command of such young and inexperienced a commander, no matter the mystical powers he held. Yet, he could not deny that what he had promised, he had definitely delivered: the whole station was indeed feeling like a ghost town.

Therefore, it came as little surprise that, without seeing a single soul and within record time, his troop of three Alliance special forces soldiers reached the Imperials’ reactor room. Being completely without any relevant experience as to the inner workings of reactor cores, Hound concentrated on keeping a watchful eye on the two reactor technicians. They had, as essential personnel, disregarded the order to return to their quarters. Fortunately, being essential was not synonymous with being interested in your job, as these two ably demonstrated.

Without interruption, the demolitions expert on his team placed the remote-activated charges and activated the back-up timers that would blow the whole thing up in two standard hours, just in case there was anything left to blow up by then.

OOOOOOOO

Being led around by Commander Siddick turned out to be rather grating, as the man turned out to be both out of shape and incredibly obsequious. As a result of that, it was quite the relief when they finally reached their first target, the supply depot and armoury of the station’s garrison.

As expected, both were empty, and Harry went to extra pains to assure the base commander of his satisfaction with that fact.

“Do you notice anything missing, Commander Siddick?” he asked the sweating man standing next to him. “Anything out of the ordinary?”

“No, sir,” the commander hurried to confirm.

“Good. It means we might still have a chance to salvage this situation, for your sake,” he sneered. “Troopers, make sure this room stays untouched. We can’t risk a traitor arming themselves.”

Javoc and Corsek stood straight in acknowledgement of the order, then placed themselves outside the door on either side. Of course, as soon as Harry and his entourage were out of sight they would be doing the exact opposite of what they had just supposedly been ordered to do and bag everything that was not bolted to the ground in the expanded bags each of them had hidden in their survival pack.

“To the hangar then,” Harry ordered the group.

OOOOOOOO

Troop 1 split away from troop 2 at the junction of docking tube 001 with the corridor to which all of the tubes were affixed. Just like troop 4, they had not encountered any meaningful resistance on their way to their targets, as the only ‘being’ they had seen had been a mouse-droid whose direction systems had been severely challenged by the almost invisible soldiers.

The remaining group, the largest and most combat-oriented one of the five teams, continued until docking tube 004, which led out to the Imperial escort frigate _Vigil_ ; the ship was a member of the well-known, from time to time infamous Nebulon-B class. Not that they were infamous for bad performance, or anything to do with the ship itself. They were actually quite reliable vessels.

No, their infamy within the Imperial lines stemmed from the Nebulon-B’s tendency to be stolen, boarded or simply defect along their captains. Today, Frost and his team were looking forward to continuing that grand tradition.

Even past the docking tube, where the group eventually split up, the corridors on the frigate were still dubiously empty, and it began to creep Frost out; a ship this big simply should not be this silent.

With only two of his men left behind him, the troop leader turned his steps toward the bridge, the painted-black astromech rolling along in front of them. As they reached the nerve centre of the ship, it too was eerily silent.

Five minutes of tense waiting later, the timepiece he wore on his wrist went off, letting him know that this was the moment they had been waiting for. Frost inserted the breathing apparatus into his mouth and watched as the astromech locked down the airlocks.

Within moments, the air-ducts started spewing out enough knock-out gas to fell an entire herd of banthas.

OOOOOOOO

“Sir, could I speak to you in private?” Mercer asked as the group of four finally reached the hangar containing the sleek-dagger shaped hull of the Raider corvette.

Harry shooed on Siddick with a dismissive wave of his hand, then turned to his ‘lieutenant’. “What is it, Mercer?” he whispered furtively.

“Don’t turn around to look at what I tell you,” the disguised deserter began. “There’s an Imperial dropship in this hangar that should just about fit into the hangar on that corvette. That thing would be perfect for us.”

The captain mulled it over for a moment. “You can fly that thing safely?” Mercer nodded. “Alright, as soon as the evacuation starts, you take that ship, we’ll let you land in the hangar bay, then we’re out of here.”

“Will do, boss,” the former faux lieutenant acknowledged.

As soon as they were done, Harry returned his attention to the distraught base commander. “So very sorry,” he said with a smile that never reached his eyes. “I had to confer with my aide. Lead on, Commander.”

Huffing and puffing as if he had just run a marathon, Siddick led them up the ramp of the corvette and into the deserted hangar/vehicle bay.

“Engineering,” Harry ordered curtly, briskly leading the way now that he was aware of it from the deck plans, he had studied. Once there, he surveyed the room, satisfied to see the outlines of two disillusioned rebel spec-ops soldiers.

“Empty too,” he commented, looking around the room warily. “Very well, then we can focus our entire attention on unveiling the traitor.”

With the utterance of the signal phrase, the two outlines in the room’s corners fired their weapons, the blue rings of a stun-shot impacting the base commander’s impressive girth almost simultaneously.

“Time?” Harry asked into the room, knowing that at least one person would answer.

“T-3 minutes until the dispersal of the gas, T-8 until the diversionary fleet engages,” Mercer replied.

Calming himself with a deep breath, the captain observed, “So we wait.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi all,  
> Having passed (yippie-yi-yay) my very big, very important exam (not hyperbole, really, really important), I am now back, and with a vengeance. Everything but the last chapter for this first part of my story is done, so I’ll be publishing a new chapter every two days until chapter 25 is out. Then, I’ll get back on my Harry Potter fic, or start with the second part for this series.  
> Hope you’re all enjoying the newest chapter,  
> alexandertheII


	12. Realities of Command

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: The Star Wars and Harry Potter copyrights lie with their respective owners, should any of them have any problem with my story being shared, I will comply with their wishes and remove it from circulation.  
> Please do not copy this work or any part of it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: The Star Wars and Harry Potter copyrights lie with their respective owners, should any of them have any problem with my story being shared, I will comply with their wishes and remove it from circulation.  
> Please do not copy this work or any part of it.

“All ships, prepare to jump on my mark,” Captain Vuli on board her EF76 Nebulon-B frigate broadcasted to the flotilla she had been assigned to command as a diversion for some kind of special operation. “The moment we drop out of hyperspace the frigates and corvettes form up on me, Yellow and Gold Squadrons move to the port flank, Magenta and Lilac to starboard. Remember, we’re there to draw their attention and survive the battle. No one is to actively engage their ships, and keep your retreat coordinates locked in.”

She looked over her bridge crew, that loyal team of officers of different species and backgrounds, all fighting together for a common cause, and it warmed the Mon Cala’s heart.

“May the Force be with us all,” she finally said as she threw a glance to the specially calibrated clock on the wall. “Commence jump in T-5, 4, 3, 2, 1, engage.”

The time spent in hyperspace was very short, for the flotilla had been waiting in deep space close to the Keldooine system, and only moments later, the group of ships was back in realspace, sitting at the edge of the planet’s gravity well. As per Vuli’s orders, the larger ships formed up in a defensive formation around the two frigates leading the small force, while the four wings of fighters moved to the flanks. The Imperial fleet reacted to their presence almost immediately, and the scattering of warships started forming up around the Procursator-class star destroyer that seemed to be the lead vessel.

“X-wings, keep S-foils closed and accelerate to maximum speed, move to flank on either side and draw their anti-fighter units away,” the gifted tactician ordered, hoping to use the new fighter-crafts already fierce reputation to their advantage. Happy that her orders were being followed to the letter, Vuli watched as the two X-wing squadrons, Magenta and Yellow, broke away from the fleet diagonally.

With satisfaction, she watched as the Imperial commander (he seemed to lack both tactical knowledge and survival instinct), obviously worried about the approaching snubfighters and their payload of proton torpedoes, sent almost the entirety of his fighters as well as the two corvettes he had after the craft she had sent out as bait.

“Magenta and Yellow squadron, open S-foils and engage their fighters, disengage when those Tartan cruisers get too close,” she refreshed her orders to the two squadron leaders. Moments later, the tactical display was filled with fighter pilots notifying the flotilla commander of enemy kills.

The first part of her plan had borne fruit, and she allowed herself a small smile as the nimble and quick Alliance fighters, having blown the inferior in every way TIEs away, started leading the Tartan cruisers, which really should have been called corvettes, on a merry chase away from the core of their fleet.

Vuli supposed things would have been very different had the repair yard been able to add his fighter complement into the fray but as the brass had promised, the special ops team had closed off that angle of attack. With a confusing mix of eagerness and glee, the captain watched the approaching Imperial warships; ironically, as far as she was concerned, the Nebulon-B escort frigate, with its impressive anti-fighter abilities, was a bigger problem than the pocket star destroyer. That problem was made even worse by the fact that this one was the original Imperial model, not the picked-over ones that tended to find their way into Alliance service. Those damn things were a lot more durable.

“Corvettes, bank to port, engage that frigate at maximum distance,” she ordered the captains of the three CR-90s she had been assigned. As she had hoped would happen, the escort frigate banked to starboard, its crew reacting to the extreme-distance fire they were now being subjected to.

And with the frigate distracted, the hammer could finally drop.

“Lilac and Gold, bank to starboard and make your attack run.”

Immediately, the two squadrons of Y-wings she had held in reserve jumped into action, their engine pods flaring before the blackness of space. The two wings of fighter-bombers, each of them containing 12 ships, each ship carrying two torpedo launch tubes, surged toward the lone Imperial capital ship, whose commander had committed the rookie mistake of stripping away his starfighter screen simply because he had seemed to underestimate the danger the old vessels were able to pose.

In half of the 48 eager torpedo launchers now waited ion torpedoes, ready to launch at a single press of a button. In fact, that was what happened, as Lilac dropped their payload. Soon, 24 ion explosions had robbed the enemy capital ship of its shields and much of its energy.

“Gold Squadron, your primary targets are their shield generators,” Captain Vuli ordered the second group that still had to complete their bombing run and were now closing in on the horribly exposed shield domes on top of the destroyer’s bridge module. “Lilac, bank around and run an attack on the engines.”

At this point, she was merely watching dispassionately while the bomber squadrons were crippling their foe. The Tartan cruisers had turned around at this point, but they had been running after the X-wings for so long that their help would come too late. The only thing their presence would achieve was that, instead of a burnt-out wreck, the Empire would be left with a burning case of ‘massive repairs needed’.

OOOOOOOO

“Boss, it’s time,” Mercer said, indicating the timer he was wearing under his uniform top. “Want me to go after that dropship?”

“Yes, do it,” Harry agreed, before turning to the Rebel soldier, whose disillusionment charm he had dispelled moments earlier. “Patch me into the PA system and activate the evacuation alarm.”

Soon, the dissonant sound of an alarm going off reached their ears, quiet though it might be after passing through the ship first. Harry threw the soldier a questioning glance and received a nod in return.

“All hands, this is ISB Colonel Landa. This facility has been compromised and sabotaged. Rebels are attacking the system, I repeat, Rebel forces are attacking the system,” he ordered in the most grave and authoritative voice he could muster. “You are hereby ordered to evacuate according to Standing Order 10-00-5. I repeat, Standing Order 10-00-5 has been invoked.”

Harry motioned for the soldier to kill the connection before turning around to look at the two ‘stormtroopers’ that had joined them on the bridge.

“You got everything?” the wizard asked Corsek and Javoc as they were taking off their helmets.

“The whole damn armoury is completely empty,” Javoc affirmed. “These bags are amazing.”

He chuckled, thinking back to a pink, rather girly example of a space-charmed bag and wondered, whether the two would have been quite as complimentary of one.

“Hey boss, where’s Mercer?” Corsec inquired, looking all around the bridge for his fellow Imperial deserter.

“He’s ‘procuring’” Harry answered, putting the last word in air-quotes, “a dropship for us. Wait a sec…”

Pulling out his handheld communicator, the captain of the _Morningstar_ activated the unit and said, “Mercer, you there? We’re ready to go, just waiting on you.”

 _“Just about setting down, boss,”_ came the prompt reply. _“Aaaaand, ready to go.”_

A smile on his lips, Harry turned toward the helmsman and the accompanying R2 unit. “Well, you heard the man; let’s get going.”

OOOOOOOO

Captain Vuli watched in considerate consternation, as a quintet of vessels emerged from the repair yard. It was a weird combination of ships, too, containing a Raider corvette, a Guardian-class light cruiser, a single Lambda-shuttle and another escort frigate, the original Imperial configuration, as well as one of those old Republic Acclamators, extensively modified as a cargo hauler.

That original feeling of consternation, though, was only a sliver of what was to come, when her sensors officer informed her that the entire complement of escape pods on the Imperial station had been launched without the installation taking even a single hit. Still, she had little choice but to proceed with her plans.

“Magenta and Yellow, close S-foils, go to maximum speed and retreat to the rally point,” Vuli ordered the two X-wing squadrons under her command. “Lilac and Gold, form up around the fleet.”

As she watched the fleet movements play out on the tactical display, things still did not make much sense… the five vessels she had seen emerge from the station shortly before all the escape pods had been launched were definitely heading in the direction of her fleet, which made sense, for the three combat vessels, but seemed absolutely ludicrous for the shuttle and the cargo-hauler. Also, why were they making such a long detour to avoid… with that particular thought, the coin dropped.

The strictly secret commando op, her fleet being ordered to pull away the enemy ships, even the escape pods. Obviously, whoever led these commandoes was planning to blow up the station, but also unwilling to kill everyone on board; it was a sentiment Vuli could empathise with.

“Captain, we’re being hailed by the Raider corvette,” the frigate’s comms officer informed her. “Patching them through… now.”

 _“Hello Captain, thanks for the help,”_ a surprisingly young-sounding voice came through the connection. _“Your fleet can disengage now, we’ll be ready to jump in 30 seconds.”_

“Acknowledged …”

 _“Captain Potter,”_ the man replied. _“See you at the rally point.”_

Amused with the audacity of the entire action, Vuli turned to her command console and gave her last orders for this particular battle.

“All ships, disengage and jump to hyperspeed.”

OOOOOOOO

“Sensors indicate all the escape pods have been launched, Captain,” the Rebel officer manning one of the stations on the bridge of the Raider corvette informed.

“Thank you,” Harry replied, throwing a glance to the soldier manning the comms station. “Contact the teams on the different ships, check if they have everyone secured, then tell Hound and his team to detonate their charges.”

“Aye, Captain,” the soldier responded.

Harry watched his orders being followed, deeply in thought. What he had told Leia rang true: he was not ready to join the Rebellion proper, and did not think most of his crew was, either. Yet, having the backing of an organisation like this, intelligence and preparation, as well as people willing to work and fight with him, felt undeniably satisfying. That was especially true after all the years where, at the most, his back-up had been Hermione and Ron, and an overly secretive and scheming Dumbledore.

“All troops report as complete, prisoners are secured,” the comms officer informed him. “Should I contact troop 4 now?”

“Yes, please,” Harry answered. “They placed those charges, they should have the honours of bringing this whole thing to an end.”

Behind him, someone snorted, and loudly at that. “Hey boss,” Mercer greeted. “Where was that attitude when you blew up those tractor beams after Arden and me had placed the charges?”

Had his tone not betrayed the jovial nature of the comment, the beaming, teasing grin certainly would have. It was a strange sight when it was combined with the dour Imperial uniforms they were still wearing.

“My attitude concerning command has evolved,” Harry snarked back. “And who would be dumb enough to give you a button that blows something up, anyway?”

“True,” the older man allowed jovially. “And giving it to Arden would be even more disastrous, don’t you think?”

An indignant noise could be heard from the ready room bordering the bridge. “I heard that, Mercer,” the witch’s voice wafted through the open door that divided the two rooms.

Ignoring the benignly bickering pair, Harry turned his attention to the two other members of his crew, who had by now changed out of their armour and stood there, only wearing the underlying body glove.

“You two alright?” he asked Javoc and Corsek, the two men leaning against the bulkhead frame to the back of the bridge. Harry felt a bit bad for not having made an effort to get to know them since they had joined his crew, and he now vowed to correct that mistake.

“Sure, boss,” Javoc replied, obviously in quite good spirits. “Would be perfect if I could get myself out of this damn thing, and something in my stomach.”

The young captain chuckled a little; yes, he had to admit that he, too, was a bit peckish after the exhilaration of infiltrating an enemy installation. Yet, he would have to fulfil his duty, first.

“How long until we can jump out of the system?” He directed the question to the room in general, since he had no idea who would be able to answer him. The beeping of an astromech droid followed his question in quick succession, yet it was hardly able to inform Harry of anything.

“20 seconds, sir,” the officer at the comms console translated, using the machine translator embedded inside his workstation. “We’ve had to stay outside the weapons range of the enemy. By the way, Hound says we should ‘watch the fireworks’.”

The gathered personnel had just their attention to the port windows, when the formerly pristine Imperial station was engulfed by a huge fireball. Automatically, the viewports on the bridge darkened to protect the occupants from too extreme an exposure to the intense light, but by then, an afterimage had already burned itself into Harry’s field of view with the power of a sun, if but for a moment.

He continued watching their progress, as first the nimble light cruiser, then the shuttle, then the frigate and finally, just before his own new ship reached the edge of Keldooine’s gravity-well, the transport they had been staying behind to protect, left the system for hyperspace. With the Rebel fleet long gone, as well, it was Captain Potter’s new ship that was to jump out last.

“Well then, little droid,” he said to the black astromech that had been preparing their jump. “I suggest you take us out of here.

Almost immediately, the viewports were filled with star lines that were quickly replaced by the already familiar, tunnel-like appearance of hyperspace.

OOOOOOOO

“So, and I swear this is true; we had just managed to get away from that teacher when Corsek here, for whatever reason, decides we’re not in big-enough trouble already,” Javoc narrated vividly as Harry’s crew was sitting around a table in the mess-hall of the corvette they had just ‘procured’. “So, instead of being happy that harpy had not seen us, he turns around, hides behind a locker and pulls out our last packet of itching powder. We spent an entire _week_ in detention after that.”

From time to time, hearing about parallels between the two realities he had lived in was a nice thing for Harry, and he enjoyed getting to know the two former Imperials better.

“Why did you do that?” the wizard asked the normally stoic Corsek; even as a teen, he could hardly imagine the man now before him being that impulsive.

“She was mean to my brother the day before,” he finally admitted. “And my mother had made me promise to look out for him. So, I did.”

Hearing that particular admission, Javoc looked quite stunned. “We got into detention because mom told you to look out for me?”

“Yeah,” Corsek replied simply, and without any further comment.

For a while, the three of them ate in silence, until another question he had been dying to ask the two crossed his mind once again.

“Hey, why did you two join the Empire in the first place?” he ventured, already preparing himself for a rebuttal; it was quite a personal question, after all. “If you’re willing to tell, me, of course.”

“Yeah, you’re our captain and we’re fighting against the Empire,” Corsek commented evenly. “You need to know, so you can rely on your people.”

Javoc nodded, although he looked quite sad doing it. “In one word? Order,” the former technician finally admitted. “I’m sure you’ve wondered why Corsek and I have different surnames, even as brothers.”

“It has crossed my mind,” Harry conceded.

“I was adopted by Corsek’s parents, although by now I call them my parents, too, after my birth parents were killed in a Separatist bombing,” he explained, much of the usual laid-back nature gone with the easy topics. “The two of us were already friends back then, so they took me in. When I was younger, and through the eyes of propaganda, the Empire seemed like a bastion of order against the kind of chaos that had taken my birth parents from me, so the two of us wanted to help with that mission.”

Harry nodded; he could relate to the feeling.

“Only problem was,” Corsek took over the story sombrely, “absolute security can only be achieved by a complete lack of freedom, and the Empire does not tolerate anyone unwilling to give up their freedom. So, when we were eventually ordered to participate in destroying villages, basically doing what the Separatists had done to the Perdiv family, we had to get out.”

It was easy to see the utter disappointment both men had concerning the Empire, and in a way, Harry thought people like these would make some of the most ardent enemies of its rule; people that had offered up part of their humanity (thankfully, he did not have to think about a fitting word for aliens, given that the Empire was also quite anti-alien) to serve its supposed ideal and now felt betrayed by a government that had lied to and used them.

Almost as if to shake the dour mood that had settled over the group at the story of his adoption into the Betsby household, Javoc shook himself a little, before throwing a wry glance at his two companions.

“We should be at the rally-point soon, boss,” the taller of the two brothers commented. “How about, after you’ve spoken to the commander of that fleet, we check out that dropship Mercer got for us?”

OOOOOOOO

Captain Vuli was sitting in her command chair, closely watching the tactical map for any approaching contacts, be they Imperial, Hutt or Alliance. Her flotilla had left the Keldooine system a good deal before Potter’s small host of stolen ships (a good deal being a few minutes, but in battle, a second could make a huge difference). She was not worried about the people on these ships, there was hardly anything left around Keldooine that would have been able to harm them, but she was looking forward to learning more about the man who had obviously led the daring raid.

“Approaching contacts,” the sensor officer announced. “Imperial signatures, but the transponder codes match the ships stolen during the battle at Keldooine.”

The Mon Cala captain leaned forward eagerly to get a good look at the ships on the visual scanners; it was really more of a hodgepodge of different vessels, the most important of which probably was the 700 m long Imperial transport, if just for the cargo it was bound to carry. Still, another two corvette-type ships and a frigate were nothing to sniff at, either. As far as the shuttle was concerned, Vuli did not think it was a new acquisition, rather that it had been that shuttle that had gotten the spec-ops team onto the station.

“Incoming visual communication,” the communications officer informed her, and the captain eagerly accepted the call.

The image that materialised on the view-screen was that of a surprisingly young man, still wearing the white uniform of an ISB colonel (that he was way too young to be wearing due to actually having achieved that rank). He had black hair, green eyes and an almost invisibly thin scar criss-crossing his forehead.

“Hello, Captain,” the young man greeted her with a smile that was deeply out of place on anyone wearing that uniform, as far as Vuli was concerned. “It is nice to meet you in somewhat less hectic circumstances.”

“You as well, Captain Potter,” the Mon Cala replied friendlily. “I assume your operation was successful?”

“Resoundingly so,” he replied, hints of a hard-to-place accent in his speech; he sounded like a core-worlder, but there was something off. “How did the fleet fare? Any losses?”

Vuli nodded sadly in reply. “We lost one of the X-wings to a pursuing Tartan cruiser and two of the Y-wings to lucky turbolaser hits from that destroyer. Could have been far worse if the station had been able to launch its fighters.”

Despite her added comment about the station’s fighters Vuli could see that even the three lost pilots would be on the young man’s conscious for a while. She herself had been through such a crucial moment in her development as a military commander, too, and mastering it was toeing the line between caring for the people under one’s command and putting the mission first.

Too much of the former would leave you wrecked with indecision, more often than not ending up with losing the entire command, anyway, while too much of a latter invariably cost you already-scarce resources and the loyalty of your crew. It was the balance between using the X-wings as bait and sending the Y-wings in for a third torpedo-run at the struck destroyer, right into the waiting maws of the Tartan cruisers. How that young commander handled this tightrope would ultimately decide his future.

“Do not fret,” she therefore lightly chastised the young man. “This was a victory! We went in with inferior forces and you holding off any fighter reinforcements let us escape mostly unscathed. Every single one of these men and women knew what they were getting themselves into, and they went willingly. Surely you would not deny them the right to fight for what they think is right?”

Captain Potter audibly cleared his throat. “No, of course not,” he finally replied. “Thank you, Captain Vuli. You are released from your duty and I will take these ships to the base. Potter out.”

OOOOOOOO

“Boss, are you okay?” Mercer asked after he had been watching Harry stare at the empty view-screen for an entire minute. The young man shook himself out of his stupor.

“Yes, Mercer, thank you,” Harry reassured his friend. “Just something the captain said. I had not thought about it like that before.”

Unwilling to debate the issue further, the captain turned his steps toward the hangar/vehicle bay. There he did indeed find the squat, grey form of the Imperial dropship Mercer had stolen from the station’s hangar.

“It’s an old Republic Low Altitude Assault Transport/infantry,” the older man informed his captain. “No idea why they were phased out really, they were excellent ships. The garrison here probably managed to keep one for themselves, because the troops really liked these things. Not a lot of armour, but they pack one hell of a punch.”

Looking at the craft Harry found that easy to believe. There was a multitude of turrets dotted around the unsettlingly flimsy-looking hull, the open doors revealing how thin the border to the vacuum of space really was when one was inside the dropship.

“Don’t worry, Boss,” Mercer half-jokingly assured him, probably after noticing Harry’s doubtful looks at the vessel’s hull. “They’ve got atmospheric shielding, so they can drop from orbit. Engines aren’t strong enough for the trip back up, though, so we’ll have to pick it back up in-atmosphere. They can even hold some speeder-bikes.”

“We’re going to have to redesign it, though,” the young captain commented. “This Imperial grey is rather… drab, don’t you think?”

That idea brought a veritably face-splitting smile onto Mercer’s face. “Way ahead of you, Boss,” he replied and pulled out a datapad showing renderings of the _Morningstar_ and their new corvette, as well as the dropship they were currently looking at.

“I was thinking that we had to make these look less like they came directly from an Imperial production line, so I was already working on something while we were on the way to our little shopping trip,” Mercer announced enthusiastically, holding the pad out for Harry to take a look.

The first image showed the _Morningstar_ , or at the very least a ship just like her; the original colour hat been replaced by jet-black, while certain lines on the ship were accentuated by gold. Nothing overly ostentatious, just a small touch of light along the dark hull. The stabiliser-wings on both sides held small representations of the ‘crest’ Harry had already seen in the designs for the armour he had transfigured: a heptagon with the stylised curve of a planet as seen from orbit, a four-pointed star floating above.

“Why is everything you design black?” he asked the enthusiastic designer of the colour schemes in his hand.

“Why because it goes with everything,” said designer joked, before turning serious once again. “Psychological warfare, just like that dagger-shape, and the stormtrooper helmets. Plus, for a crew trying to track you with visual scanners, there’s few things more annoying than a ship that is as black as the space behind it.”

With an understanding nod, and somewhat mollified by the tasteful addition of the golden lines, Harry flipped the page to take a look at what had been jutted down for the corvette.

“Why are there two designs?” the captain inquired, flipping back and forth between the two sets of images. “The only difference I see is that one of them is missing the solar panels.”

“Ah, yes,” Mercer enthused. “Which one of these we use will depend on a few experiments I would like you to do with your abilities. Firstly, I believe you have the ability to create mass out of nothing, right?”

“Wouldn’t say nothing, it takes a serious amount of energy, and channelling too much of that will leave you really tired.”

“Well, do these runes of yours take energy to work, too?” the older man questioned, looking eager and anticipatory.

“Of course, they draw from the ambient…” Harry fell silent for a second as a plan began forming in his head that he was sure mirrored the one in Mercer’s. “They draw from the ambient magical energy around them. I’d noticed that it is very strong in this reality. You want me to make a rune-based multiplication spell to provide us with fuel, making the solar panels redundant.”

“Thereby giving the turrets on the top-deck a larger field of view” Mercer finished. “So, think you can do it?”

Harry had already drifted off by that point though, theorising about possible ways to make this work.

“Hey, Boss,” Mercer cuffed him on his upper arm. “Think you can do it?”

“Oh, sorry,” the captain apologised. “I was already drifting off. Yes, I can do it. A friend of mine at school had a drinking bottle just like that; as long as a tiny bit of water was still inside, it would always fill back up. Oh, and before you go, can you push over that crate?”

Already on his way to the heavy box the man turned around once more. “What do you want an empty cargo-crate for?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi all,  
> As promised, two days later and a new chapter for everyone’s enjoyment. As for the Nebulon B frigate, I recently stumbled upon a video reimagining that class made by EC Henry. If you search for Imperial Nebulon-B on YouTube, maybe add that channel name, you should be able to find it.  
> Suffice it to say, I liked what I saw and now, I have that image of an Imperial Nebulon-B stuck in my head, and I can’t help but imagine it exactly like that. Sorry if that makes him feel like his rights as a creator have been infringed upon, that is not my intent here.  
> As always, hoped you enjoy the new chapter and you’ll read from me again in two days.  
> alexandertheII


	13. A Bit of Experimentation

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: The Star Wars and Harry Potter copyrights lie with their respective owners, should any of them have any problem with my story being shared, I will comply with their wishes and remove it from circulation.  
> Please do not copy this work or any part of it.

Led by the sound of explosions, Arden stormed into the hangar bay of the corvette, only to find nothing out of sorts, besides Harry with his staff and Mercer with a blaster repeatedly firing upon an innocent cargo crate.

“By Allya, what are you two doing?” she asked the two men, even as another streak of light left Harry’s staff, impacting with and finally rupturing the crate.

“Hey Arden,” Mercer screamed. Then, remembering the earmuffs he was wearing and removing them, he continued, “We’re trying out what happens when something Harry has made bigger on the inside is destroyed.”

Harry nodded eagerly, although he seemed way too excited for the whole thing to be just about a simple experiment; Mercer’s love for explosions seemed to be rubbing off.

“Yeah, well you destroyed that crate so badly, I am sure now would be the time to check,” she prompted, being rather curious about the whole thing herself. If these tricks were safe to do on a combat ship, the possibilities seemed endless; if the results were less promising… well, that was an import bit of information, too.

By that point, the two men had reached the defeated and broken crate, both of them looking very dissatisfied with what they found.

“Uhh, that’s not pretty,” Mercer observed, standing over the box, his head inclined to look through the hole blasted into the side. “What are you looking at me for? It’s your rune stuff that did this.”

“And it was your idea to ‘try it with something organic’,” Harry retorted, and Arden finally saw what they were arguing about. Where once there had most likely been the reasonably clean insides of a shipping crate, a mangled mass of flesh and blood had been evenly distributed around the entire interior.

“You took meat out of our provisions for this little experiment?” she inquired, raising an eyebrow at her older comrade. “You know I could have eaten that, right?”

“And we needed to know what would happen to any being inside one of Harry’s space-extension fields when they break,” Mercer countered. “What is one little steak compared to the knowledge that a magically expanded hangar bay would be an incredibly bad idea?”

Watching them go at each other, Harry finally let loose a loud groan. “Could you guys stop it with the bickering, please?” he complained. “I’ve had enough of that for two lifetimes where I came from.”

The two of them stared at each other for a while, before first Arden, then Mercer broke out into raucous laughter.

“But it’s so much fun,” she objected, winking at the older of the two men. “Fine, but just for you.”

Grumbling, Harry accepted that deal and led her over to an assortment of canisters, the kind of which Mercer had said tended to contain fuel. With the former Imperial’s help, they managed to find one that was completely empty, and the wizard began describing their plan to utilise his skills for the production of fuel.

“If you already know, what you want to do, what am I here for?” she finally asked after the lengthy process of Harry describing an entire rune-set.

“I don’t know, you suddenly just showed up. Also, don’t forget, I promised to teach you,” he replied with a winning smile, an expression Arden was sure she was mirroring; sure, he had promised to teach her his magic, but things had been so hectic all around, he had also seemed to have forgotten.

“Until we can get some kind of wand or other focus for you and I find more alternative potion ingredients, runes are something you can learn without any of that,” Harry explained. “How did you and your sisters cast your spells, anyway?”

Arden thought back to her early days of instructions with the elders of her tribe. “We just said the words and used our hands, mostly. Sometimes we danced.”

“But no tools of any kind?” her teacher asked, as if to reaffirm some observation. “Interesting…”

“Boss,” Mercer interjected at that. “Might not be my area of expertise, all that magic stuff, but didn’t you say the ‘ambient magic’ of this place was extremely strong compared to where you come from?”

That comment seemed to flip a switch in Harry’s mind, and his formerly brooding face returned to a wide smile. Without comment, the young man began moving around and looking closely at his hands, until eventually, he pointed a finger at the still-smouldering cargo crate and intoned, “Expulso!”

With a loud crash, the box flew through the air and impacted the hangar blast doors, leaving behind a small pile of charred, bloodied shards.

“Merlin’s threadbare tighty-whities,” he cussed loudly. “I mean I’d noticed wandless magic was easier when I made my staff, but I haven’t been doing all that much offensive casting, lately.”

He stared at his fingers in fascination for a while before returning his attention to his pupil.

“Alright, we can start on the way back to the Rebel base, but we’ll be looking for a wand for you as well.”

OOOOOOOO

The flight back to Yavin 4 took them more than ten days, lengthened as it was by the hyperdrive on the cargo ship and escort frigate they were with being only half as quick as the ones installed on both the Raider-II (whose drive systems had been upgraded from the Raider-I) and the Guardian cruiser. Still that time was neither boring nor did it go unused.

Most importantly, there was always someone present on the bridge who was not a droid, seeing as they were travelling first through Hutt space and later through the Outer Rim territories, basically the galaxy’s Wild West. Luckily, they were not required to post many guards for prisoners, as well, because the rank and file of the Imperial crews had been either handed over to Vuli’s flotilla or expressed an interest in defection (those were mostly the younger crewmembers); they were still disarmed and put under guard, but it was much lighter than it would have needed to be otherwise. The higher-ups had all been transferred onto the captured frigate and were under lock and key there, where the largest contingent of Rebel soldiers could keep an eye on them.

Meanwhile, Harry and Arden were working on their magic; him training in wandless casting, while she picked up everything, she could from watching and listening to him.

“Basic safety rules for Transfiguration,” he quizzed his student, even as he was holding up a shield charm she was peppering with stunners.

“Don’t eat or drink anything you conjure, unless you made it to be permanent,” she panted between two spells. “Permanence takes energy and skill, increase in complexity takes energy and skill, increase in mass takes energy and skill.”

“When is a potion the better alternative?”

“When… Stupefy!” Arden replied, hitting his shield with the strongest spell she had ever managed to hit him with. “…the one receiving it is injured, you’re not sufficiently qualified to prevent a spell backfire, you want effects for which no spells exist.”

After finishing her answer, Harry let his student pepper his shield charm with a few more stunners until he called, “Halt!”

Panting and sweating profusely, the two mages were standing opposite each other in the hangar, sucking in big gulps of air as they could get them.

“If all the energy comes from the magic, or the Force around us, why is this so damn tiring?” Arden half asked, half complained. The answer to that question, though did not come from Harry.

“Maybe because you’ve been at this for almost two hours?” Mercer ventured from where he was repainting the LAAT/i with black paint the resident wizard had permanently conjured one evening directly before bed when the intense tiredness that action had induced was not all that detrimental.

“Two hours?” Arden gasped. “It felt more like 20 minutes, at most.”

Harry shook his head and pointed his finger at the clock on the wall that showed the shipboard time they had set to the one they were used to from the _Morningstar_.

“We started at 1400 hours after lunch, now its 1600 hours. And what is so tiring is the fact that while hte magic around you might be a limitless source of energy, the applications of which are mostly limited by the density of that energy, your body still has to mould it to your wishes. That’s what is hard on you physically,” he said, although admittedly, he too had somewhat forgotten the passage of time. Still, holding a shield charm, wandlessly for two hours; well, he would be lying if he said he was not somewhat proud of himself. “Time for a break, I think.”

Arden seemed to heartily agree with him on that as she picked up her water bottle, enchanting it had been her first rune project, and greedily gulped down almost the entire content, knowing that, within an hour or two, it would have refilled.

“You guys were really going at it,” Javoc commented as he stuck his head out of the dropship. “Didn’t even notice us coming in.”

At the mention of us, Corsek too appeared from within the transport. “This thing is really awesome; when I was still in the Army, my unit so wanted one of these. The new IDTs are okay and all, but these larties pack so much firepower. Their mass-driver rockets can punch through capital ship armour, no problem.”

“And I always wanted to work on one,” Javoc added, the professional appreciation for an excellent design showing on his face. “Who knew deserting would let us fulfil that wish.”

Obviously finished with whatever they had been doing inside the craft, the two brothers returned to the outside to join Mercer in his mission to transform the drab grey into an unsettling, if beautiful black.

“Boss, I was thinking,” the oldest of the three painters ventured, valiantly ignoring Javoc’s comments concerning the danger of him doing something as cerebral. “If you can make our fuel tanks self-refilling, could you also do the same to our tibanna gas-cartridges?”

Harry thought about that for a moment; from a theoretical standpoint it was certainly possible, and practically speaking, it did not sound all that bad either. The cartridges, despite containing enough gas for 500 shots, were not all that large, each shot only taking a miniscule amount, so keeping up with the depletion certainly would not be an issue. Still there was something troubling him.

“I’d rather not,” he finally admitted. “They’re so small that, even with a standard backpack, we could take dozens into the field. On the other hand, such a small piece of equipment is easily lost. I’d rather not have any of our enemies, or just some random bandit even, stumble upon my enchanted technology.”

Mercer nodded in understanding. “Oh, that reminds me,” Harry suddenly piped up. “I need all of the enchanted bags back with me; found a way to make the inscriptions completely unreadable, so at the very least they can’t be reverse-engineered if they fall into the hands of the Empire. Because that Vader guy would definitely be able to activate enchantments after some trial and error.”

“Will do, Boss,” Corsek affirmed, to nods from the others. “Have you thought of a name for our new toy, yet?”

He gestured all around them with a whirl of his hand, showing he meant the corvette.

“Actually, I have,” Harry replied as he too grabbed a paint-gun and began applying the black coating to their new dropship. Then, his pompous delivery severely undermined by the painting tool in his hand, he declared, “In keeping with the naming convention established by the _Morningstar_ , this corvette shall henceforth be known as _Lightbringer_.”

When there was absolutely no reaction, a small detail he had forgotten to think of earlier made itself loudly heard inside his mind. “Right, you guys have different religions here, too.”

OOOOOOOO

12 days after the skirmish in the Keldooine system, the small flotilla of stolen ships that had escaped the destruction of the Imperial repair yard left hyperspace at the edge of Yavin Prime’s gravity well. Immediately, the vessels adjusted their trajectories toward the planet’s fourth moon and fired their engines until they reached a stationary orbit around 35000 kilometres above Massassi Station.

All of them but one.

Out of the middle of the formation, a sleek, grey, dagger-shaped craft broke away and continued to approach the moon as the manoeuvring thrusters all over the hull worked hard to slow down the descent through the atmosphere, even as the temperature indicators on the bridge noted the rising heat all over the hull. On that very bridge, elated at seeing a certain someone on that Rebel base again, Harry Potter was looking through the transparisteel windows, automatically tinted against the glare of atmospheric re-entry. Next to him stood Mercer, equally eager to reach the base of their allies, if only to start the modifications on their newly acquired corvette.

“How come you like working on our vehicles so much?” Harry asked the older man, noticing the elation almost radiating off of him. Mercer’s face was graced by the kind of smile commonly associated with one reliving fond memories at that question.

“Back at home, I used to tune speeders with my father and my older brothers,” he said fondly. “Up until my twelfth birthday I wasn’t allowed to get even close to the engines, so I painted instead.”

“How very wholesome,” Arden commented from further behind on the bridge. “With your defection, is your family in danger?”

“No, they’ll be alright,” Mercer assured the two of them, yet there was a despondent note to his voice. “We’re not exactly talking; they were angry when I joined the Navy. They’re somewhere in the Rim now, still fixing speeders as far as I know. Not even the Empire goes to that much trouble to hurt one single deserter.”

Deciding not to comment on the man’s obvious dislike of the idea of seeing his parents and brother again, Harry instead opted to look out of the windows again, as the ground inched ever closer and it became possible to make out actual trees in the mass of green that were Yavin 4’s jungles.

 _“Approaching ship, this is Massassi Station; you are entering restricted space, please state your name and intent,”_ the familiar stick-in-the-mud voice of the flight controller echoed from the comms station. The captain of the ‘approaching ship’ stepped up behind the officer manning that station and indicated for him to open the connection.

“Massassi Station, this is Captain Potter on the corvette _Lightbringer_. Generals Vernan and Cracken are awaiting us,” Harry replied, although the debriefing could not be further from his mind in that particular moment.

They were quickly given landing clearance and the helmswoman set down the ship on the strip of jungle-free ground around the hangar. Given the corvette’s size, any attempt at flying it inside the structure was bound to destroy at least something, so they did not even try. With barely a shudder, the landing gear extended, and the vessel made contact with the ground.

“You’ll get onto the refits as soon as possible?” Harry asked Mercer as they were already on their way to the hangar/vehicle-bay where the large ramp descended from the belly of the corvette. Hitting the button for the lowest level as soon as the two were inside the lift, Mercer nodded.

“Yeah,” he replied. “I’d like to get everything done as soon as possible, while these people still have our agreements and our contributions firmly in mind. Don’t suspect them of playing a rigged game, but these are politicians we’re talking about. What did Arden say she wanted to do?”

Harry snorted. “Looking for our next target,” the captain answered. “I told her it might be a bit early, should we be needed for the attack on the Death Star, but she insisted. I think she just wants to try out all her new skills.”

The barely-there feeling of deceleration told them they had reached the lowest level, and the two men stepped out of the turbolift and into the hangar bay, its only occupant currently the repainted LAAT/i. Past the dropship, the high ramp led them down toward the ground and the waiting reception committee.

“Captain Potter,” Dodonna greeted, dignified as ever.

However, willing as he was, Harry had no opportunity to react in kindness, as he was soon enveloped in a surprisingly crushing hug by Leia, who had stormed out from within the crowd of officers.

“Nice to see you, too,” the wizard greeted the unabashedly elated princess beaming back at him. “General Dodonna, General Vernan, General Cracken, a pleasure to see you. I am happy to report that our mission was a success, light casualties and no fatalities among the troops, one X-wing and two Y-wings lost in space.”

“Very impressive,” Vernan commented, looking at the dagger-shaped vessel they were standing under. “The _Adjudicator_ is now the _Lightbringer_ , or so I’ve been told?”

“Correct, General Vernan,” Harry agreed, he too looking at the sleek craft. “Mercer has the general outlines for the refit, so if you would be able to assign the necessary technicians, we would like to start the refit as soon as possible.”

“That won’t be a problem,” Dodonna assured them genially. “You have all the personnel willing to defect on your ship, I presume.”

“Yes, they are making ready for disembarkation and debriefing. The soldiers tell me they were compliant and peaceful the entire trip. They’re mostly junior officers or gunners and specialists, some technicians. Most of the higher officers we left with Captain Vuli’s flotilla,” the young wizard informed them. “Now, if I could get access to an appropriate ship, I would be happy to try making it a bit stealthier.”

OOOOOOOO

Considering the rather impractical implications a constantly obscured ship would bring with it (not the least of which was people, or worse other vehicles crashing into it), Harry had opted to think about a rune-based application of the disillusionment charm. It was not hard, per se, he knew how to do it and combine the whole thing with the same enchantments making reverse-engineering impossible that he had placed on the fuel containers, but what worried him was the delicate technology built into the Alliance starfighters.

Therefore, he opted to go step by step, adding layer upon layer onto the enchantments, starting with the disillusionment. Currently, he was working under the fascinated gaze of Luke, Leia and Ben, carving runes in the Y-wing’s outer hull at select points.

“I… I feel something from these symbols,” Luke commented as his hand was inexorably drawn to the string of runes. The ageing Jedi master next to him nodded.

“They are imbued with the Force, yet lack any sort of malice,” Ben observed. Obviously taking note of Harry’s offended look, he explained his comment, “Much of what you are able to do reminds me of the Sith’s sorcery, which is dark to its very core. Once, even the mere presence of artifacts appointed with it made me collapse. I’m just wondering how the Jedi never managed to use it like you do.”

Harry snorted in annoyance. “You just answered your own question,” he replied calmly, all the while continuing to etch the runes into the metal. “I’ve recently had a lot of time for some more profound thoughts and what I’m about to tell you is one of the things I learned from thinking about my own life up until now: Doctrinal orders are completely useless at adapting to new things, as long as their very survival is not threatened. I bet there were Jedi that found out you could use this without becoming evil but, as a doctrinal order, straying from the treaded path probably wasn’t encouraged.”

As he had been talking with Ben, Harry had not noticed Leia coming closer, seeming almost as, possibly even more fascinated with the runes as Luke had been. Before he could stop her, she had already put her hand on one particularly unfortunate sequence of runes, which started glowing dangerously. At this point, the wizard was beyond caring for any sensibilities, and he simply shoved the young woman away and put his own palm onto the rapidly heating metal surface, pushing into it the strongest cooling charm he could muster, while the other hand started furiously scratching away the activated rune sequence.

After waving a basic healing charm over his reddened hand, he returned attention to the slowly rallying woman he now saw he had thrown to the ground.

“Sorry,” he winced, looking at her apologetically. “You activated the sequence responsible for collecting the energy, only there is nothing in place to stabilise or use it yet. Had to make sure the whole thing wouldn’t blow up on us like a giant battery with a short-circuit.”

Leia shook off the cobwebs and proceeded to stare at her own hands in shock. “How did I do that?”

“Seems you have almost as much of an instinctive connection to magic… as Luke does to the Force. Mybe the’yre the same, and you’re just better at different things,” Harry observed, taking note of a slight hint of discomfort in Ben’s face; filing away that observation for later, he returned to carving runes.

“Sorry I almost blew up your project,” Leia apologised, now standing next to Harry, interestedly watching his progress, yet with her hands firmly clutched behind her back.

“It’s alright,” he assured the uncomfortable young woman. “Just, please don’t activate stuff of which you don’t know what it does, or that I’m not done with. I have no idea how big of an explosion something like this might trigger with how dense magical energy is here compared to where I come from.”

For a while, Harry worked in silence with Leia watching over his shoulder, even as Luke and Ben returned to hitting each other with their lightsabres. When finally he was able to place the crystal that would work as a sort of capacitator for the magical power the enchantments needed, multiple hours had passed, and even the two other men had grown tired of their sparring, yet the young woman was still silently watching as he slowly made his way along the ship.

“There, all done,” the wizard finally declared, even as he cracked his joints just by standing back up straight. “Do you want to activate it?”

Leia nodded eagerly and, following Harry’s instructions, put her hand on the small crystal placed inside the Y-wing’s cockpit. From one moment to the other, the formerly well-defined form of the fighter-bomber became but an outline, only visible due to the close proximity that sitting on its frame afforded them. The only part that was unchanged was the cockpit, and only because the canopy was open.

“It worked,” the princess enthused, jubilantly squeezing the stuffing out of Harry, who, loathe as he was to do so, had to reign her happiness in somewhat.

“Well, we knew the enchantment would work, once activated,” he commented wryly. “The question has always been, whether the ship still would.”

So, to clear up once and for all any questions as to that regard, Harry slipped into the tight corners of the cockpit and began the start-up sequence. He listened carefully, yet with increasing confidence, as first the reactor, then the engines began to hum contentedly.

“Alright, basic functions are working,” he observed, grinning widely as he saw Leia jump down from the vessel and grab his commlink.

“Basic functions seem to be working,” he repeated, now over the comm system as the cockpit canopy began to close. “Checking sensors next.”

As it turned out, the sensors were working just fine, as were the weapons (he murdered an innocent tree to test the lasers) and shields. Unfamiliar as he was with the craft, he had no intention of taking the Y-wing for a spin. Still, there was yet more to be done, Harry reminded himself as he set back down and activated the cooling sequence.

OOOOOOOO

“So, it works, and it doesn’t interfere with any of the electronics?” Dodonna confirmed with the self-satisfied wizard in front of him.

“Depends how you define ‘interfere’, I suppose,” Harry admitted. “The ship itself was just fine, but the astromech Luke tried to take flying really didn’t like it. No damage, it’s completely fine, but it seems like having the camouflage up interferes with their computing. So, no jumping to hyperspace with the visual and thermal camouflage being up.”

“I think that is something we can live with,” the bearded general snorted. “How quickly can you make them, or show one of our people how to?”

Having expected the question from the moment he had brought up the possibility of doing something, Harry shook his head apologetically. “Sorry, can’t do that,” he said matter-of-factly. “I would be willing to show a droid whose memories are wiped after it’s done helping me, but can you imagine the chaos something like this could cause if it fell into the wrong hands? I can protect this from being reverse-engineered, but not from being ripped out of somebody’s mind.”

Indignant as Dodonna looked at the mere mention of someone in the Alliance blabbing to the Empire, both Vernan and Cracken actually looked quite relieved to hear it being said.

“He is right,” Vernan chimed in. “A cloaking device with this few drawbacks must remain under the tightest security we can achieve. We should also be careful not to overuse it, unless we want the enemy to find a way around it, either. Now, thermal imaging is out, due to the… thermal camouflage, but those ships still have mass it would be possible to detect.”

Harry vehemently agreed with the man’s assessment. “And I don’t have any idea, how I would be able to hide that. Additionally, I believe that any further effort at such large-scale modification would severely hamper the ships’ functions,” he added. “I’ve given Luke Skywalker’s droid, R2-D2 the needed information to apply the same modifications and allowed the little guy to do it to twelve of your X-wings. The Princess, Skywalker and Kenobi should all be able to handle the activation.”

The gathered Alliance officers looked at him in consternation.

“And where will you be, Captain Potter?” Cracken asked with a furrowed brow.

“Why I will be hunting a bounty, of course.”


	14. Off to New Adventures

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: The Star Wars and Harry Potter copyrights lie with their respective owners, should any of them have any problem with my story being shared, I will comply with their wishes and remove it from circulation.  
> Please do not copy this work or any part of it.

“So, tell me, what do I need to know about my new ship?” Harry asked, feeling like a bouncing ball of energy that particular morning.

Maybe, possibly he had served as a sounding board and then cushion for the, in his honest, wholly biased opinion, quite awesome Princess Leia Organa the previous evening; not that he would tell anyone, because doing so would mean it would get back to Arden and Mercer, who would then most likely start ripping him about it mercilessly.

“Well, well, well Boss…” the older man greeted him on the bridge of the _Lightbringer_ , and Harry immediately knew he would be embarrassed. “Guess we aren’t too lowly for you after all, even if you’re now consorting with a princess.”

Cursing his own prediction’s accuracy in this case, the wizard did his damnedest not to blush too overtly.

“None of your business,” he replied eloquently. “And there was no consorting, at least not the kind you mean when you say it like that… ‘consorting’.”

Hearing that answer, Mercer grinned evilly. “No consorting? Trust me Boss, it happens to a lot of guys. I mean, you’re under a lot of stress… Ow, ow, ow!”

“Stinging hexes,” Harry informed the older man. “Be nice, or they’ll be the next thing I teach to Arden. Now, let’s try again: What do I need to know about my new ship?”

Grumbling a bit about the general unfairness of life among Force-sensitives, Mercer nonetheless began talking to him about the specifics of their Raider-II-class corvette.

“150 metres, class 1 hyperdrive, as opposed to the class 2 in the Raider-Is, small hangar/vehicle-bay; should fit around three to four fighters along with our larty, depending on the size, and maybe a few speeders,” he rattled down, counting off the points on his fingers. “Six heavy double laser-cannon turrets under breakaway panels on the top deck, two light single turbo-laser turrets on the sides, ion cannons and two ordnance launchers the Rebels were nice enough to install for us.”

Having gotten an extensive education on starship weaponry during their trip back to Yavin 4, Harry was aware of the different weapon types and could immediately spot the anti-fighter role for which the ship had been designed.

“As for modifications: we tore out most of the crew quarters, took down some walls, replaced some of the tiered bunks with cots, built a shooting range, training room, workshop.” All the while Mercer was talking, the charmingly smarmy smile grew ever wider. “Really, these KDY ships are horribly overstaffed; also, I’ve looked over the applications and transfer requests for our crew. I’m guessing you saw the new paintjob and the loss of the solar panels.”

Harry’s eyebrows had been steadily rising, as he was well aware. “You did all of this, in three days?”

“We had many volunteers,” Mercer offered for an explanation, just as the shoe dropped on everything else, he had just said.

“Wait, applications and transfer requests?” the captain inquired, causing a low chuckle from the former Imperial.

“You didn’t think we could fly something like this all by ourselves, did you?” he asked, even though he clearly already knew the answer.

“Hadn’t really thought about it…” Harry admitted. “How many do we need? And how will we pay them?”

“Short answer: around twenty, plus four for the _Morningstar_ , maybe some foot soldiers. And we won’t be paying them.” At Harry’s affronted look, Mercer elaborated, “We provide room and board, as well as a cut from any bounty we rake in. It’s standard practice among the larger bounty hunter crews. Believe me, the kind of people we can hunt with this ship will have each and every one of them swimming in credits soon enough.”

As he mulled over what had been said, an odd discrepancy jumped out at Harry and he questioned, “Why were there so many quarters when the ship can be run with so few people?”

Mercer sighed loudly and let himself sink down the side of the small walkway intersecting the two pits where the bridge crew had their stations. “As I said, KDY vessels are notoriously overstaffed, and the Raiders are actually quite tame to what you can find on an ISD,” he explained. “Firstly, the Empire has almost infinite funding, especially now that the Death Star is finished, and their defence budget is huge. At the same time, the more people they bind directly to themselves, either by having them join the military or having them work in semi or fully nationalised companies, the more loyalty they engender. Therefore, manpower is almost unlimited, at least where less specialised skills are concerned. I mean, just look at how they burn through pilots with those TIEs.”

Harry nodded, while he continued listening closely. “So, any gain in efficiency is worth it, even if it means the crew grows by twenty more people. Also, the more people you have on a ship, the better they can keep an eye on each other; some COMPNOR observers are open secrets, some you may never know about. Even the possibility that anyone in your direct group of associates _might_ be a snitch is enough to discourage rebellious ideas in many heads.”

In that moment, the young wizard realised that, the more he heard about the Empire, the less he liked it.

“That threat of retribution thing they have going on with the Death Star,” he analysed wide-eyed. “They’re doing the same thing to their own soldiers…”

Mercer nodded gravely. “Combine that with the fact that many still remember the Clone Wars, and much fewer people than you would think desert or defect, even with all the evil stuff the Empire does. Now, on to less depressing topics: starfighters…”

OOOOOOOO

“You’ll be careful?” Leia assured herself as she and Harry were watching the people who would be joining the crews of the _Morningstar_ and the _Lightbringer_ walk to their respective ships. Most were former Imperials who had been ‘captured’ during the raid, but some were also Alliance special forces who were hoping to get some more training in under Captain Potter, maybe ‘get some of that cool armour’. And, in the case of Hound, the former Bothan scout and now special forces soldier, it was the chance at his own command, which he now held over the _Morningstar_.

“I am always careful,” Harry insisted, perhaps a bit too forcefully to be believable.

Leia, whom he had come to know as someone with the required drive to sacrifice for the cause, should the need arise, chose not to comment on it. Instead, she asked, “So, who is your target?”

Harry shrugged his shoulders. “No idea, Arden picked them. Somewhere around Corellia, though,” he replied, confident that any target the Dathomirian picked would be both worth their time and absolutely deserving of whatever they were handed.

“And you’re sure each and every one of the new recruits is on the right side of this?” the Princess inquired, glancing worriedly at the group of people vanishing into the belly of the _Lightbringer_.

“Yeah,” the wizard replied confidently. “They all agreed to have their minds searched by me; if a spy manages to stay undetected through that, they deserve to be able to do all the spying they want.”

Despite herself, a small little laugh escaped Leia’s lips. “I’m going to miss you,” she finally said, as everything seemed to be ready for take-off. “I know you made those mirrors, but they won’t be the same.”

“No, they won’t,” Harry agreed melancholically. “Still better than nothing. Be safe, Leia.”

“You too,” the young woman said, and gave him a shy kiss on the lips. “’Vincent’.”

Without another look back, he had the feeling that would only make things more painful, the captain boarded his ship via the large ramp. Inside the hangar, the new crewmembers were arrayed before the painted-black dropship, inside of which stood Mercer like he was using it as a platform.

“Hello everyone,” Harry greeted them as soon as he stood next to the older man, eliciting a smattering of greetings amongst the gathered. “I want to thank each and every one of you for joining us on the _Lightbringer_ , we quite literally couldn’t do it without you. You’ve all met Lieutenant Fenwick, he’s my second-in-command, and out of a weird hobby also the one you can thank for designing both our armour and the new uniforms that you will be finding in your quarters later.”

Some laughter seemed to be making the rounds at that, as people seemed unsure whether their captain was joking or actually telling the truth.

“Now, almost everything aboard this ship will be open to some debate, within reason, but I won’t stand for mistreatment among the crew. Some of you might be Imperial deserters, some of you might have been harmed by the Empire in the past, but from this point in time onward, I expect you to be one thing above all else: a team,” Harry iterated the ground-rule he had thought up for his ship. “There will be no bullying, no excessive baiting, no physical altercations. And just to make one thing clear, that absolutely includes the droids; whether you think their consciousness is on the same level as that of organics is irrelevant. They are an important part of our crew without which we would need many, many more crewmembers meaning less bunk-space for each and every one of us. If you have a conflict with another crewmember, come to one of the five of us and we’ll settle it.”

The gathered crew nodded acceptingly, and Harry felt a surge of gratitude for Mercer, who had obviously chosen them well; even the group of astromechs standing in the back (they were the Raider’s original complement and their ownership had simply been reset by Alliance slicers) seemed happy.

“Any questions?” he called out, receiving a resounding ‘No, Sir!’. “Very well, then. I’ll hand over to Arden Tla, 2nd Lieutenant and probably our hand-to-hand combat instructor.”

An unsettlingly eager gleam in her eyes, of which Harry was not sure where it came from, the witch stepped onto the larty and addressed the crowd. “1600 hours, training room. Mandatory for all personnel unless you have a shift. We’ll be using hands, knives, sticks, staves, and everything else you can think of that you can hit somebody with,” she announced, only increasing the eagerness on many of the faces, especially those Harry recognised as Rebel or former Imperial soldiers. “I’ll be coordinating any training we do on this ship, so if you have some special skill you would like to share with the others, let me know. The shooting range is open all through the day, as is the training room. Every day at 0900 hours, I’ll ask the soldiers among you to help any non-combat personnel with their shooting, because everyone on this ship will be expected to wear a handgun and a knife at all times. You will attend shooting training three times a week. Any questions?”

A rather placid-looking man in mechanics’ overalls held up his hand and was signalled to speak by the witch.

“What if we don’t want to learn how to fight?” he asked, to the astonishment of many of his comrades.

“In that case, there’s the door,” Harry pointed toward the ramp. “We are going to be in dangerous situations, and while we will do our best to not let it happen, we might be boarded someday. Usually a ship like this would have a complement of thirty troops, we’re only thirty people overall. I won’t be sending the technicians or the bridge crew into battle, I just want you to be able to defend yourself should it become necessary.”

The captain’s impassioned speech had convinced the unwilling technician and the man did not take the opportunity to leave.

“Alright, if we’re done with that,” Arden picked back up after waiting a few more moments should another question come up. “The target we’re going after is a group of pirates preying on smaller freighters around Corellia. They haven’t done anything big enough, yet, to annoy the Empire, but the Corellians want them dealt with; there is a bounty both on the destruction of their operation, as well as on many of the members of this group. We will let you in on any important information that comes up. Questions?”

There were none, so Harry retook the stage. “Alright, you will find your quarters according to your datapads. Once there, you can change into your uniforms. Well launch in fifteen minutes, those slotted in for bridge duty are obviously required to attend, everyone else is, of course, welcome. Dismissed!”

Over the din of retreating footsteps, no communication was possible, so the five members of the original crew waited for the new members to be gone until they began talking amongst themselves.

“Good speech, Boss,” Mercer commented. “Although, making Arden a 2nd Lieutenant? We all know she’s more of a drill sergeant, right?”

Harry scowled at his second-in-command. “What did I just tell the crew about baiting people?”

Both Arden and Mercer looked at him sweetly, with her even trying to bat her eyelashes, not that it was particularly effective.

“But we both have fun with it…” the witch objected. “Surely there’s no harm in that?”

With a loud sigh that told everyone of his resignation as to the matter Harry allowed, “Fine, but not in front of the crew. We have to set an example.”

“Deal,” Mercer interjected. “So, Arden, anything more about that bounty?”

OOOOOOOO

On the flattened, jungle-free area in front of the massive Great Temple on Yavin’s fourth moon, a large crowd of Alliance personnel had gathered to watch the departure of the two ships. Both of them had been painted in an intimidating, maybe frightening matte black. Yet, in combination with the golden accents strewn across their hulls, the design was not without a certain beauty. A dangerous beauty, sure, but beauty, nonetheless.

Chief amongst those watching were certainly the attending generals, as well as the orphan Princess of Alderaan, all four of them standing at the forefront of the crowd as they watched the engines on both ships burn and the vessels themselves slowly lift into the sky.

“I really hope they do decide to join the Alliance at some point,” Vernan commented to the enthusiastic nodding of Cracken. “All of them, especially Potter, could be a huge asset to special operations.”

There seemed to be general agreement on that. “Did you notice they did not need to bunker any fuel?” Dodonna asked his fellow officers, all the while watching they were not overheard.

“Oh yes; some more of those abilities of his I would assume,” Vernan observed drily.

“Then why would he not share that with us?” Dodonna questioned, quite obviously getting rather annoyed with the young mage, or sorcerer.

“Because we did not tell him we needed it,” Leia interceded on Harry’s behalf. “I think he assumes that, since we did not ask, we have no problems with fuel. Had we asked, he would probably refuse to do whatever he did to the _Lightbringer_ to any other ship for fear of it falling into the wrong hands, but I can guarantee you that he would think of something he would be willing to do. He might ask for a favour, but could we really complain about that?”

With no one willing to contradict her on her point, the Princess turned back around to watch as the _Morningstar_ and the larger corvette, a bit like a big sibling, were getting smaller and smaller.

Damn, she was missing Harry already.

OOOOOOOO

It was a groaning, sore group of people that appeared for the evening meal in mess later that day. With everyone but those assigned to specific jobs required to attend physical training, Arden’s class had included everyone but four of the crewmembers, those being a gunner, a technician, a sensor/comms operator and Mercer, who had kept watch on the bridge. In all, 28 people had attended the training session, the first half of which had been dedicated to pure and simple physical fitness, while the second half had featured knife-combat under the auspices of one of the Alliance Special Forces soldiers.

The servant droid providing the meals certainly looked happy as he was experiencing the programmed-in joy of people enjoying his cooking despite the rather basic programming on matters pertaining to the actual preparation of food.

Harry too was rather sore as he sat down between Corsek and Javoc, to the never-ending amusement of Arden who took her place opposite him, together with Mercer.

“I would have thought you would be in better shape, Boss,” she commented, eyeing him with delighted twinkles in her eyes. “You’ve been living in the wilds of Dathomir for a year.”

Making his unhappiness known with a snort, Harry grabbed a fork and began eating his extremely average but definitely filling serving of… well, he had no idea what exactly it was.

“It’s been more than a month since we left Dathomir,” he responded after a few mouthfuls had at least calmed down his empty stomach. “And I had magic; tends to make things a little easier. You should have seen how out of shape some of the older people are where I come from.”

“I suppose I get the joy of whipping you into shape,” the witch allowed. “You’ve put me through quite the ordeal with all that magic training, too, after all. But you,” she then turned to Mercer, “you’re a military man; you should know better than to let yourself go like that.”

Now it was on Mercer to snort and look offended. “I was an officer on a starship, then on a huge Battle Station,” he exclaimed. “Sure, I got my steps in, but it’s not like I was doing a lot of combat training.”

“Oh, that’s so going to change.”

OOOOOOOO

Over the following days, the entirety of the crew regularly chafed under the rigorous training methods of Arden ‘Sarge’ Tla; still, no one was pounded more rigorously than Captain Potter himself, which gave most of the personnel a certain appreciation for how lucky they were. That was, of course, excepting the special forces, who simply elected to join most of Harry’s lessons.

What time was not spent training under Arden, was mostly training Arden, whose skills in at least the basic requirements of a mage as Harry’s home had practised them were growing in leaps and bounds. Additionally, he would spend at least an hour a day under the skilled tutelage of one of the veteran soldiers in the shooting range, increasing his skills with handguns and rifles.

With all that was going on, it honestly came as a surprise to Harry when, barely a few days after they had left the secret Rebel Base, the _Lightbringer_ left hyperspace for a last time in the Corellian system.

Here, they were only one small fish among many, even if they were a more highly-armed fish, and while the _Morningstar_ sped off to begin its investigations into the source of the pirate attacks, the _Lightbringer_ was in a situation so utterly mundane, its captain had hardly been expecting to ever experience it again.

They were stuck in traffic.

Despite the somewhat lower demand for landing permits than was experienced by ecumenopoleis such as Coruscant or Christophsis, the number of people wanting to land on the surface, and especially in the capital Coronet City was still staggering, relegating the _Lightbringer_ to a holding pattern for almost an hour, until they were finally allowed to set down in the city’s spaceport (for an exorbitant fee, of course).

A small ‘token of their appreciation’ to a dockworker later, they had been supplied with names and addresses for local dealerships carrying the equipment that they were out to buy; specifically, a few speeder bikes (military-grade, obviously), two hover-vans and some probe droids.

As it turned out, the addresses for the establishments supposedly carrying what they needed were all in what the worker had called the Blue Sector. Seeing the district now, Harry had no trouble imagining why they had been sent here, given the illegality of at least some of the wares they were hoping to acquire. And with all four of them (Corsek had opted to stay behind on the ship with most of the crew) visibly armed and obviously proficient in using that armament, they were not accosted. Whether the same could be said about the surprising number of tourists and other off-worlders shuffling through the streets was still very much up to debate, though.

Their first port of call was a dealer of used speeders, both the legal as well as the less-than-legal kind. It was the less-than-legal, maybe grey-area, stock they were interested in. Therefore, Harry waited around in the dingy establishment, pretending to look at some of the more mundane articles on sale. Pretending, that is, until he found one thing, he did not have to pretend to be interested in.

“Mercer,” he called the Imperial deserter over, whose face had once again been lightly transfigured to hide his identity. “Look at this one.”

Harry pointed clandestinely at the landspeeder he had found; it was a sleek-looking craft despite its considerable length, rather flat and aerodynamic, yet encased in what was quite obviously some serious armour.

“Ahh, a man with taste,” the sibilant voice of the shop owner reached Harry’s ears as she stepped around the speedervan he had been looking at. “Let me see… guns, which you obviously know how to use, same with those knifes. Criminals?”

A smile spread on the black-haired woman’s face. “Maybe, but not the malicious kind. Rebels? Perhaps,” she observed. “Not that it would stop me from selling to you. Every Corellian worth his salt is something of a rebel, is he not? I think I’ll settle on bounty hunters, even though you seem a bit more… disciplined and civilised than many of your colleagues that are more… rough around the edges.”

“We would like to buy a speedervan, maybe two, for our missions,” Harry confirmed. “Captain Vincent Dash, by the way.”

“Well, Vincent Dash, you indeed have a good eye, then,” the proprietor continued her sales-pitch. “The Aratech Repulsor Company Arrow-23. Eight metres long, 400 km/h maximum speed, ground clearance 4 metres.”

She proceeded to open one of the speeder’s doors. “Probably most interesting for you, would be this,” she knocked onto the thick plating of the door. “Military-grade armour plating. They designed it for big game hunting, but it does have its other uses.”

“Could I take a look at the engines?” Mercer inquired, eyeing the vehicle critically.

“Naturally,” the woman replied. “Can’t expect to sell informed customers a piece of merchandise they haven’t inspected.”

While his second-in-command was going to town on the Arrow’s engines, Harry regained the saleswoman’s attention.

“If you have two of those, and my colleague says they’re both fine, we’d be very interested,” he told the widely grinning proprietor. “Also, we’re in need of some smaller vehicles of equal quality… maybe military-grade…”

“And why would you believe that I carry items of such illicit nature?” she inquired innocently, although Harry could easily tell she did not even believe in her own lies.

In keeping with the hilarity of her feigned denials, he simply pointed toward the outside of the shop where someone was, with only very moderate amounts of subterfuge, selling small plastic bags from inside a coat.

“Oh, a smart one, too,” the shopkeeper purred. “So, probably already taken.”

Harry snorted. “Yeah, I suppose I am.”

“Too bad,” the proprietor commented. “Follow me.”

She led him into an equally dingy back area, where yet another gathering of vehicles was parked, although they were spaced more closely and less on display. While many of the models seemed to be the same as the ones in the front, merely duplicates that did not need to be presented twice, there was also a considerable presence of speeders Harry had not seen before. Of the latter group, the woman led Harry to a row of speeder bikes, mainly consisting of two distinct models.

“Military-grade speeder bikes,” she declared proudly, signing down the line. “Republic BARCs, Imperial 74-Zs, your pick. Although those 74-Zs are really only for you when you have manpower to spare, they’re basically an engine and two handlebars.”

“I assume the BARCs are also more expensive?” Harry inquired, raising an eyebrow.

“They’re newer and better… so, obviously,” the saleswoman replied. “How many do you need, anyway?”

He thought about that for a while; the LAAT/i had space for four of them, and it was probably not worth the hassle of storing any more of them. Using more of them would require landing the _Lightbringer_ , and if they already had the ship on the ground, they might as well use the speedervans.

“We’ll need four,” the bounty hunter replied. “Checked over by my associate, just like with the two vans.”

“30000 credits,” the shopkeeper offered.

“10000,” Harry rebutted.

“You want to make me destitute?” she objected. “25000 credits.”

“20000,” he stated with an air of finality. “And you help us in finding out targets by introducing us to your CorSec contact. We’re on the hunt for that gang of pirates that has been harassing freighter pilots, so us taking them out can only be good for business.”

“What contact…”

Without even waiting for an answer, Harry pointed at the group of vehicles that were quite obviously mustered out of police service.

“Never mind,” she admitted. “Deal.”

OOOOOOOO

Harry and Arden were sitting in a dingy cantina on Coronet’s blue sector that evening, waiting for the shopkeeper’s contact in CorSec, the Corellian Security Forces. Basically, a police force under corporate leadership. Very efficient, if they wanted to be, but mostly concentrated on Corellia itself and beholden to corporate interests.

“You the bounty hunter Ridrissa was talking about?” they were suddenly approached by an aged woman in an off-white tunic with green trimming; the uniform of the CorSec officers.

“If Ridrissa has a used speeder lot in the Blue Sector, then probably,” the young wizard replied. “You’re her ‘unfortunately idealistic friend’ in CorSec?”

The woman joined them in their booth, settling down onto the booth next to Arden. “Sounds like her, alright,” she admitted. “Not that she’s completely wrong. Name’s Relgi, intelligence analyst with CorSec. I hear you’re going after those pirates?”

Harry nodded. “Good,” Relgi the intelligence analyst commented. “Empire’s doing nothing, CorSec isn’t exactly equipped to handle threats in space. I’ll give you everything you need, if just for the pleasure of knowing these people are off the space-lanes.”

Elated as he was, the captain could not find it in himself to simply accept something this nice at face value. “What’s your angle?”

“Ridrissa asked me to help, and it’s not even something I’d be averse to doing, anyway,” Relgi responded with a shrug. “A friend asked me for a favour because her business is suffering from these attacks. Learn how to barter favours, you’ll need it.”

Nothing more was said by the analyst before she vanished into the night once again, leaving behind a small data plaque lying on the table where she had sat.


	15. On the Outskirts of Corellia

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: The Star Wars and Harry Potter copyrights lie with their respective owners, should any of them have any problem with my story being shared, I will comply with their wishes and remove it from circulation.  
> Please do not copy this work or any part of it.

As Harry and Arden entered the _Lightbringer_ that evening, they were greeted by a small swarm of saucer-shaped, floating droids, each with multiple ‘eyes’, small pincers and an antenna. The five had already been painted in the black colour Mercer tended to anoint every one of their acquisitions with.

“Got them cheap off a shop selling used droids,” Harry’s second-in-command announced from where he was working on one of the speeder bikes. “Package deal, couldn’t say no, really. Way too good an offer.”

“You stayed inside the budget?” the captain inquired, the question quickly being answered with a nod. “Seems you got a good deal, then. Let’s take a look at the data we got from that CorSec contact.”

Throwing a longing glance at his various projects in the hold, Mercer followed Harry and Arden toward a briefing room close to the bridge, quickly followed by the tactical officer on loan from the Alliance.

“Can you patch in the _Morningstar_ , please,” Harry asked the officer who complied with a quick ‘Yes, sir’.

“Hound, good to see you,” the bounty-hunter captain greeted the Bothan commander of his first ship. “We have some new intel on our dear friends, the ruthless pirates.”

Pushing the data plaque into the associated slot on the holographic console quickly produced a readout, showing the Corellian System with its ‘Five Brothers’, as well as Corellia’s moons and the various stations in orbit around the multiple planets. Most importantly though, it showed the positions of all the distress signals concerning pirates over the preceding three months.

“My goodness, they really do have a problem with pirates it seems,” Mercer observed in shock. “That must be dozens of attacks. I’m surprised the Empire didn’t step in…”

“Not exactly true, sir,” Hound interjected. “See, some of those attacks were bold and important enough to warrant the sector Moff’s intervention; those are marked by the Imperial crest.”

“Can we filter these by certain traits?” Harry inquired, looking at the tactical officer.

“Yes, sir,” came the prompt answer.

“Please do that,” he ordered. “Start with the kind of ship that was attacked. Nothing larger than, say, a medium-sized freighter. Nothing with escorts, either.”

Immediately, around two dozen blips on the system map vanished, still leaving at least thirty, with two distinct groupings clustered in different parts of space.

“No survivors,” Mercer added solemnly. “They take the ships and any cargo, then dump the bodies of the crew.”

Even as the tactical officer entered the new parameters and the dots were starting to vanish, it became clear that they had found their quarries’ hunting grounds. There, densely clustered around an imaginary line in space they could see a large number of data-points fitting the parameters of the search. What they could also see, was an asteroid field.

“Reckon they have a base on one of those asteroids?” Harry asked his crew, finding that most everyone seemed to agree. “There’s no way we can find a hidden asteroid base in that chaos, we’ll have to find a way to follow them…”

OOOOOOOO

“Captain, we have received a distress signal from the region you wanted us to monitor,” one of the _Lightbringer’s_ bridge officers informed Harry over his commlink.

As positive as that news was for their ongoing hunt, it also meant that the captain was distracted, if just for a moment. Yet a moment was all Arden needed; the first whirl with her staff had him disarmed, the second lying on the ground, a foot on his chest.

“Good try,” the witch commented. “Next time, try not to get distracted.”

Harry shot the ‘drill sergeant’ a mock glare, before waving his hand over himself, quickly removing all the accumulated sweat of a training session with Arden. A second spell later, the captain was clothed in his captain’s regalia again; black, tailored pants, a long-sleeved jacket that went just a tad lower than the hips, belted with black leather. While the jacket itself was jet-black, the epaulets and the seams were adorned in gold, as was the peaked cap Mercer had insisted on.

Frankly, from time to time Harry felt quite silly wearing it, yet someone kept insisting he wear it anyway. Supposedly, it made him look dashing, while also underscoring his authority. While that was just Leia’s opinion, he had to admit that the allusion the design supposedly made to old (meaning really, really old) Republic Navy uniforms was not bad either for an ally of the Alliance to Restore the Republic.

The two of them took a lift to the highest deck and were on the bridge without much delay, yet the ship was already on the move, as per the standing orders issued as soon as they had assumed position, lying in wait for the pirates to strike again.

“How far?” Harry asked the former Imperial manning the helm.

“We’re five minutes out in realspace,” the officer replied. “The _Morningstar_ can be there in three.”

The captain nodded curtly before looking at the sensor operator. “Did the distress call say anything specific about the attacking ships?”

“A group of fighters, sir, nothing more specific. No ordinance weapons in the background of the call, though, only ion canon fire.”

“Whoever was on that ship will probably be dead by now, Boss,” Mercer offered up, probably noting Harry’s conflict of conscious. “Multiple fighters attacking a single light freighter with ion weaponry? They’ll be dead in space in minutes, boarders onboard little later. Best chance at catching these people will be to follow whatever they use to tug that freighter back to their base.”

Loath as he was to admit it, Harry knew his second-in-command was right and they should act accordingly; at least taking out these pirates would be saving lives in the future.

“Alright, bring us in slowly, avoid drawing attention, stay undetected if possible,” he ordered the helmsman before turning to the comms operator. “Tell Hound to tail them in the _Morningstar._ ”

Little happened in the following minutes, yet they were still some of the most sense ones Harry had spent in his entire life. Slowly they were encroaching upon the site of the attack on the freighter and when they finally reached the place, their expectations were fulfilled in the grimmest way possible as they saw three dead bodies floating in space, all of them showing signs of blaster burns.

“Is the _Morningstar_ on their tail?” Harry asked the comms operator, who replied in the affirmative. “Alright, then get Smitts into a space-suit to recover those bodies. We can hand them over to CorSec when we’re done.”

Smitts was one of the soldiers that had joined them on the _Lightbringer_. Although, other than her comrades in arms, she was not an Alliance-member, instead being one of the Imperials from the warships they had captured over Keldooine, she got on well with the other members of the combat team. Of particular use to the crew was her training in boarding actions and her proficiency with vacuum, zero-g operations. Quickly, the soldier was dispatched from the corvette’s hangar, the rope of a winch in hand which was then used to tow into the ship the three dead spacers, murdered and unceremoniously dumped by callous criminals. What an ignominious fate, Harry mused.

“Sir, the _Morningstar_ is on the comms,” the corresponding staffer alerted the gathered bridge crew.

“Captain,” Hound greeted over the audio connection. “We’ve found them, sending you the coordinates now.”

OOOOOOOO

The asteroid the group of pirates had made their base of was rather huge, in Harry’s humble estimate. Of course he knew that these chunks of rock, ice and whatever else might have conglomerated to form them could range in the hundreds of kilometres, but he was also flying through space inside a 150 metre ship; compared to that, a floating rock of 2 kilometres was simply massive.

“…five uglies, one large tug, one boarding shuttle,” Hound finished her report. “Seemed rather professional, too, just lacking the equipment and manpower for anything bigger than taking out small freighters. Went in hard and fast, quickly pulled back again.”

“Understood,” the bounty-hunter captain replied. “Anything on their base?”

“One large hangar-door, no external defences, no shielding,” the Bothan former scout continued. “I’d suggest simply blowing through that door with one or two salvos from our turbolasers. They have atmospheric shielding in place, so we can still capture them alive.”

“Shock and awe?” Mercer ventured, receiving nods all around. “Okay, so we take the larty, wait for the _Lightbringer_ to shoot a hole into the hangar doors… then what?”

“Here, I come in,” Harry interjected, holding up a small sphere of metal the soldiers among them recognised as a thermal detonator. “I did some tinkering when I wasn’t being tortured by 2nd lieutenant Tla and managed to put together a stun grenade. Mostly still a standard thermal detonator, but the energy is not dissipated as heat or pressure. Instead, it knocks out any targets in the vicinity of the blast.”

The special forces soldiers as well as the one marine on their crew looked very intrigued at the prospect of such a weapon and could be seen actually craning their head as Harry handed the innocuous device around.

“Problem is, I couldn’t really test exactly this model on the ship,” the captain admitted ruefully. “Tested the modifications, obviously, but with somewhat less power. So, for the first few you throw, throw them further away rather than closer, alright.”

Generally speaking, the boarding team seemed to be agreeable. Harry was just about to tell everyone to get dressed up, when he noticed his second-in-command was trying to get his attention.

“Boarding team, dress up; everyone else, battle stations,” he ordered. Waiting for the throng of people to leave the briefing room, the wizard closely watched the older, very much uncomfortable looking man. “Everything alright?”

“No problem, Boss,” Mercer replied stoically. “I just don’t think it would be a good idea for me to join the boarding team. The crew has done really well, which will easily let you forget how new they are to this, either to the ship or to the other people on it. Either one of us should be here, and since you’re more valuable on the ground, I should stay on the ship.”

Harry showed his agreement in an appreciative nod. “Good thought,” he commented. “You can keep an eye on the station, see if anyone tries to run away through some backdoor.”

“Exactly my thoughts, Boss.”

OOOOOOOO

“Are we committing any infractions against the rules for bounty hunting here?” Harry inquired over his helmet commlink with Mercer on the other side. “We’re shooting at them before we have made ourselves known to be bounty hunters.”

There was a certain degree of chuckling audible through the connection. _“Well, we’re not shooting_ at _them, rather we’re shooting at a non-registered space station without a discernible owner. The shooting at them comes later, and you’re welcome to try and make them lay down their weapons.”_

Now, it was on Harry to snort disbelievingly. Right up until he thought about it.

“Mercer, can you activate the searchlights on the _Lightbringer_ as soon as we bring the gunship through the hangar doors?” the wizard ventured. “Maybe we can get some of them to lay down their weapons without any further shooting…”

 _“Ahh,”_ Harry’s second-in-command hummed approvingly. _“Render the enemy unable to react, even for a little while. Will do, Boss.”_

“Everyone ready?” Harry asked into the group of boarders arrayed all around him, receiving nothing but ‘Yes, sir’ in return. “Then let’s do this. Pilot, activate our searchlights when we fly inside.”

OOOOOOOO

Morvis was a simple man, with an appreciation for the simple things in life. Things as booze, the occasional whore, upgrades for his blaster, stuff like that. Other than that, and of course his own survival, the man was interested in little, and certainly not what effect his actions had on the galaxy at large.

The galaxy, after all, had never cared about the effects it had on him, either.

For the moment, he had to admit to feeling rather disgruntled and not at all in the good mood that their crew of pirates nabbing a shipment this valuable should usually elicit. This bad mood was, as far as Morvis was concerned, wholly due to the captain’s ridiculous demands that their hidden base be patrolled at all times. Obviously, the stick in the arse serving in the Imperial Navy gave you had never been removed from that one.

And who was going to attack them now? Sure, after the first few prises, maybe, but the Empire had clearly shown they did not care if some pirates took out a few light freighters, murder a few spacers. In a twisted way, the general state of disinterest on the part of the Imperial authorities was not all that surprising; many of the ships they had taken had been crewed by aliens, and at least half of them were smugglers, anyway.

He was just about to try and snatch some of the Corellian brandy they had scored during an attack the previous week, when the asteroid in which the pirate base set was suddenly hit by shockwaves the likes of which he had only ever felt before when onboard a starship that was under heavy fire.

However, very much different from that earlier event, this time he could not simply punch in some hyperspace coordinates and be gone. Instead, he had to watch impotently as the hangar-doors that had once seemed so strong were ripped open by acid-green turbolaser fire. For a brief moment, Morvis was scared that he would get sucked into space until he remembered the atmospheric shielding.

That was when nothing less than a wraith glided into the hangar bay: completely black, save for a few specks of gold and those eyes… those eyes.

Around two bubbles he assumed were turrets in the nose of the gunship someone had painted two eyes, slanted and clearly angry despite how stylised the whole design was. Both from that vessel itself and from behind it shone large, strong cones of light blinding him and the second pirate who had pulled guard duty. And then, all of a sudden, a booming voice filled the hangar bay.

“This is Captain Vincent Dash,” the man, for it was a male voice, thundered. “There is a bounty set on every member of this pirate group. You will either surrender peacefully, or my crew and I will be quite content to go with the dead part of ‘dead or alive’.”

Now, Morvis might have been a simple man, but he was certainly not a simpleton, and he knew a good offer when he heard one. It was obvious that these people had a ship outside, and that ship was armed with turbolasers. Should this Captain Dash choose to go with dead rather than alive, all he had to do was shoot out a part of the base without atmospheric shielding and atmospheric decompression would be doing most of the work for him.

Without losing another moment, the pirate drew his blaster pistol from its holster on his hip and threw it away before laying on the ground, face down, hands on the back of his head. Unfortunately, the other guard was much less practically inclined, something Morvis had been chafing to address for a long time; instead of doing the sensible thing and surrendering, the idiot drew his weapon and started firing.

However, it did not do him much good, as within seconds, a black-armoured figure was upon the guy, hitting weak points all around his body with a painfully fast, long and smooth wooden staff.

Mere moments later, a group of around ten other armoured soldiers had left the dropship Morvis now, with a bit of time, realised was one of those old Republic gunships from back in the clone wars. While only three of the ten were wearing the same kind of fully enclosed armour the first one had, each and every one of them was clad in black from head to toe.

Again, the only exception was a glimmer of gold, this one in the form of a symbol Morvis could not quite make out.

Quickly, one of the less elaborately dressed boarders came over to him, cuffing his hands with a pair of binders. Just as the soldier was done cuffing him, the one the others seemed to consider their leader (no way to tell someone’s gender from underneath these armours) made their way over to kneel down in front of the newly captive pirate. With a hiss of unlocking atmospheric seals, the person took off that absolutely fear-inducing mask.

Behind the black of the armour, as surprising as that seemed to Morvis at that moment, was a normal man. Sure, the green eyes were somewhat unusual, but other than that, he looked like a standard human.

“How many others are on this base?” the man, by his voice now identified as this Captain Dash, demanded, and though refusing to answer was on his mind, if just for a second, the pirate knew that any attempt to do so would ultimately hurt him and possibly the others.

“Around thirty,” he mumbled, head still lying on the ground.

“Defences?”

“If you go along the corridor at the back of the hangar, behind the second door, we have some barriers and a repeating blaster.”

“Much obliged,” Dash replied. “You might just have saved some lives; doesn’t that feel good?”

OOOOOOOO

“Morquen, Sestac, Gur, secure the hangar. Smitts, Tevo, Grindal, with us. We’re going to try out those new grenades,” Harry ordered the boarding team, the various members of which echoed ‘Yes, sir’ around the huge room, although those scheduled to participate in the field test of the new invention seemed somewhat more enthusiastic. “Oh, and clear those freighters while you’re at it.”

The strike team followed after their captain deeper into the base. Counter to every instinct there was, no defensive emplacements had been placed along the long corridor they followed deeper into the asteroid, nothing intended to slow them down to allow the defenders more time to prepare or even taken out one of their numbers, not that it would have worked; they were meticulous in their advance. With that thought came the realisation that, yes, the mere presence of a tunnel like this was a delaying-tactic, because any commander valuing the lives of their men would be advancing carefully. Crafty, he had to admit.

Finally, at the infamous second door, the group spread out to make ready for their entry, Arden and Harry next to it with the others stacked behind them. Both drew the modified thermal detonators from their belts and the wizard was just about to open the door when he remembered that, indeed, he was a wizard.

“Homenum revelio,” the young bounty hunter whispered, setting loose a wave of magic that enveloped and showed sentient species; in this case, their boarding party as well as around twenty people waiting behind the door. “Twenty people, all grouped in a long line around ten metres into the room. Corsek, you push the door opener, Arden, toss to the right, I will toss to the left. Then I go in, put up a shield. First person inside takes out whoever’s using that repeating blaster. All clear?”

“Yes, sir,” the mostly disciplined soldiers replied, while Arden only gave him a pouty, “Of course!”

Hand still half on his staff, Harry held out three fingers, then two, then one.

With a hiss, the poorly maintained door slid open, quickly followed by two modified thermal detonators flying through. Even as the two explosives loudly announced their arrival, a hailstorm of blaster fire tore through the door, peppering the first door they had come through completely unaccosted.

“Protego,” Harry incanted and, against any better instinct, briskly walked into the repeating blaster’s direct line of fire. Immediately, he could feel the immense draw on his strength that kind of bombardment caused. Luckily, before he could fall over in sheer exhaustion, Grindal came through the door behind him and immediately hit the heavy gunner with a stun shot.

Everything that came after was somewhat blurry for the bounty hunter, as he continued defending the boarding team while it stormed into the narrow chamber. When eventually it seemed like the last of the defenders lay unconscious, the shield charm simply winked out of existence.

That was the moment the actual last defender chose to announce himself, having hidden in an alcove on the side during the entire fight, shooting a nasty-looking blaster pistol in Harry’s direction. Despite his tiredness, he had just about enough presence of mind left to jerk his staff into the way of the shot (although how he had done that particular feat, he was later unable to tell).

Then, he succumbed to exhaustion and sunk into unconsciousness.

OOOOOOOO

What eventually woke Harry up again was a wave of pain from his face.

He opened his eyes, only to see Arden standing over him, right hand still poised for another slap, looking way too happy for the opportunity.

“Thanks for waking me up,” the wizard grumbled conciliatorily. “I’ll show you the enervate charm on occasion, less painful to wake someone up with that.”

Head still very foggy with his exertion, Harry accepted the hand the Dathomirian was holding out for him to grab. As she helped him up, he looked around to take in the chaos that had fallen over the room where the pirates had mounted their defence.

“Where are the others?” the captain asked Arden, peeking into the corners of the room, but only finding unconscious and cuffed pirates.

“Catching stragglers,” she replied, waving her hand into the general direction of the rest of the base. “I offered to stay with you, make sure you didn’t do any more profoundly stupid things.”

Harry looked at her offendedly, waiting for an explanation what the profoundly stupid thing he had done was supposed to be. “Putting up one of your shields against a repeating blaster while you yourself said your power level with that old staff of yours was far from your abilities? Sounds like a bad idea to me.”

Despite his inner grumbling about it, the wizard had to admit that what she had said was at least somewhat true. With a groan, Harry began looking for the very staff the witch had been talking about, only for her to actually hold it up. Well, half of it, at least.

“You caught a blaster bolt with it,” she informed him. “Wood tends to not like that. Seems like you’ll need a replacement, and one more up to par with what you need.”

For a few moments, Harry simply stared at the sundered weapon, and it felt a bit like the destruction of his old phoenix feather wand had felt, in a time that seemed so long ago now. The feeling was not as intense, after having the staff for barely a year, yet having made it with his own magic, there had been a certain connection that was hard to deny.

“Yeah, maybe I’ll get an opportunity to use that crystal I found on Dathomir now,” he replied wryly. “Who knows how powerful my spells could be here with a proper wand.”

Arden watched him closely a while until she objected, “I think you should continue using a staff. It gives you a way to defend yourself when someone gets too close to easily use magic.”

While the thought of using a staff continued to be a bit weird to him, Harry had to admit that the witch had a point; with some of their enemies using things like these lightsabres, or the vibroblades he had seen some of the soldiers possessed, having a way to defend himself in close quarters certainly seemed advantageous.

“Still have to find something to use for it, though,” he mused, only to be quickly poked into his side by Arden.

“I think you should see something,” the witch said, before starting to stride out of the room.

“Arden,” Harry called her back. “Less enthusiasm, more practicality. You can show me later, for now there are prisoners to guard.”

With a small pout, the Dathomirian returned to the room, where she leaned against the doorframe, eyeing her captain for a while. Steadily growing uncomfortable under her unflinching gaze, Harry began squirming in place after about a minute.

“You seem more in control than when I met you,” she finally observed. “The training has done you good, making decisions for yourself and others has done you good.”

Not quite sure how to respond to that, Harry simply stayed silent and thought about what Arden had said. Arguably, out of the people in this new reality, she was the one who had known him the longest, and there was no denying her observational abilities, if she was ever inclined to actually employ them. And now that he was thinking about it, the young wizard had to admit that he was happier than he had ever been before; for a time, during the hunt for Riddle’s horcruxes, he remembered his idea of becoming an auror getting less and less appealing.

These days, though, although he was not exactly the same as a hunter of dark wizards, he was contributing to the safety of the citizens of the galaxy, and mostly on his own conditions, too. There was no red tape to cut through, like he would have faced in the Ministry of Magic, no annoying superiors for him to appease, insisting upon the general upstandingness of someone who was quite clearly evil. No, now he, or rather Arden, could simply scroll through the bounty database, find someone whose crimes were so blatant they had no problem handing them over to whoever had posted the bounty and go after them.

Yet, something was missing, and Harry vowed in that moment that their next mission would be something to help the Rebel Alliance. For, despite his wish for autonomy, Captain Potter longed to be part of the larger struggle.

OOOOOOOO

Chandrila, whose chief exports had long been considered agricultural goods produced by the vast swathes of farmland all around the planet, as well as supremely argumentative politicians forged in the mostly civilised, but rather heated discussions of the House. Every citizen having an equal, direct voice had a natural tendency to sometimes produce violently different opinions.

These very politicians, or rather one particular example of them going by the name of Mon Mothma, was also the reason that, inside a hastily erected sensor outpost on the planet’s first moon, staffed only by a few members of the Alliance to restore the Republic, a shrill alarm went off. The hyperwave signal interceptor, the main reason the small outpost had been built, was showing a massive object approaching out of hyperspace.

Within moments, Alliance fighters that had been lying in wait for more than a week, constantly alert for any sign of the approaching planetkiller, were rising from the surface of the planet. In one of those fighters, a Rebel X-wing given to him after his phenomenal simulator scores, Luke Skywalker was ascending with his wingmen, their Potter-provided cloaking devices already engaged as they followed after the small fleet of starfighters meant to run interference for his group as they approached the Death Star.

Only having seen the massive station once before, Luke was once again both awed and disgusted as he saw the monstrosity, sitting in space and approaching Chandrila, which the Empire had obviously selected as the next target for their campaign of fear.

Well, not if he had anything to say about it.

Both to port and starboard, wings of fighters peeled off, turning to engage the oncoming masses of TIEs, yet the Jedi apprentice and his two comrades remained unaccosted as they closed in on the battle station. When finally, the exhaust port that was their target came into view, Luke’s conscious mind screamed at him to use the targeting computer, yet something told him that was the wrong choice.

Instead, just like Ben had taught him, he let himself sink deeply into the Force, letting it guide his minute corrections to the X-wing’s course…

…and then he fired, and the attacking fighters drew back.

And the Death Star, Tarkin’s monument of fear and cruelty exploded, its reactor struck by the proton torpedo from Luke’s fighter. For a moment, something he had heard Mercer say, about families and children living on that station came to mind, yet his oncoming feeling of guilt was assuaged as Luke turned the nose of his fighter around to see the green sphere of Chandrila.

Chandrila and its 1.2 billion citizens, still alive and breathing.

Nonetheless, he dearly hoped never having to kill on such a vast scale, ever again.


	16. Relics of War

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: The Star Wars and Harry Potter copyrights lie with their respective owners, should any of them have any problem with my story being shared, I will comply with their wishes and remove it from circulation.  
> Please do not copy this work or any part of it.

“Greetings, Captain Potter,” the Leia in the two-way-mirror said, a soft smile gracing her face.

With a bow of his head, Harry replied, “Your Highness.”

Neither of them could keep this banter going for long though, as they soon fell into silently laughing at each other’s over the top formality.

“I thought you should know that the Death Star has been destroyed,” she finally informed him, looking oddly torn at the news. “Tarkin was about to have Chandrila destroyed, so we didn’t have much choice. I just wish we wouldn’t have had to do it, that Luke wouldn’t have had to do it.”

Harry felt his eyebrows rise at that news, not having been aware that Luke was even staying on Chandrila.

“How did he take it?” the wizard inquired, worried for the mostly likable Jedi apprentice; sure, at the beginning his interest in her had made Leia uncomfortable, but Harry considered things forgiven after the farm boy had backed off when bounty hunter and princess had started becoming closer.

“I don’t really know, there was only a short call to inform us of the developments,” Leia responded. “And you? How did your hunt for those pirates go?”

“Rather well,” Harry responded, silently jubilating about how flawless the operation had gone. Aside from the destruction of his staff, obviously. “Lost my staff though, so I will have to make something new and Arden insists it be something I can use in close quarters.”

Getting no reaction from her for the moment, he continued. “We captured 28 pirates, two got killed by some new less lethal grenades I’ve been tinkering with. Also found two ships they must have stolen recently, both YT-series. One YT-1300, looks a bit like that rust bucket Solo was flying, one YT-2000. Mercer says that one was probably built by some other manufacturer using leaked plans.”

“What are you going to do with them?” Leia inquired interestedly, and Harry could see a gleam of acquisitiveness in her eyes.

“We have no one to fly them and giving them to CorSec will just end in some corrupt officer making a quick, wholly undeserved buck,” he observed disgustedly. “If you have anyone in the area who can pick them up, consider them a donation to the Alliance’s effort.”

When, again, there was little reaction, the young wizard began getting worried. “Hey, are you alright?”

The princess shook her head like she did when she was brought out of some thought she had. “Sorry, was a bit distracted there…” she apologised. “I just thought of something, I’ll be right back.”

Having nothing to do after she had suddenly disappeared from inside the mirror but to look at the ceiling of her room, Harry took up the datapad on his bedside table (he had gotten the captain’s cabin, naturally) and went through the list of things they had captured from the pirates’ base.

Blasters, obviously; some explosives; body armour. None of it was better than what they already had available. Provisions were always a good thing though, even if Harry would insist on every piece of food, they had taken from the pirates being thoroughly assessed by the servant droid’s sensitive receptors before anything of it was served to the crew. The pirates’ starfighters, charmingly described as ‘crap’ by Mercer in the note attached to the item in his list, would probably either be scuttled or simply used as sources for replacement parts.

“Thanks for waiting,” the voice of Leia Organa broke through his thoughts and then continued, in her official ‘Alliance voice’, “We would like to ask a favour.”

Intrigued, Harry inclined his head for her to continue. “An Alliance-friendly merchant on Wroona is in danger of being found out by the Empire. Normally, Alliance Intelligence would help him out, but our presence in that system has been compromised just before the Death Star was destroyed.”

“And now you would like me to go in there and save that poor sod’s arse?” the wizard inquired teasingly. “Anything else I need to know?”

“If you ‘save the poor sod’s arse’,” Leia quoted his own words back at him snarkily, “He’ll most like be able to help you with your weapons problem. Palestro is an able gunsmith and knows his way around melee-weapons, too. Also, if you have to know, Wroona does lie at an intersection of trade routes, so I’m sure you’ll find some pirates there for you to hunt. Not that people out there could pay as handsomely as the Corellian government.”

Surprised by her outburst, although he probably should not have been, Harry smiled at her; winningly, he hoped. “Sorry, Leia,” he said, and he actually really meant. “Of course, helping someone who got into trouble just doing the right thing is reward enough. And not every job will be as easy and well-paid as this one.”

With the business side of their relationship now somewhat satisfied, Harry inquired, “So, how are you? And I mean you, Leia, not the Princess of the House of Organa.”

Suddenly very different from the self-assured vision of strength he had seen only moments before, the young woman in the mirror took a deep shuddering breath; she was still strong, and Harry would never hear anything else being said about her, but it was a different kind of strength that he saw now.

“It’s really settled in,” she finally replied after a few more deep breaths. “Knowing that the thing that took away my planet is gone now helped… I think. Oh, and my sister is back at the base, so that helped. Oh, you should meet her…”

Abruptly, Leia’s face was once again replaced by concrete ceiling, prompting Harry to return to perusing the inventory of their loot: the two freighters, 28 pirates, many of them with outstanding bounties, each and every one of them worth at least 1000 credits just for their membership in the pirate group. A rotary blaster with its generator; credit chips, the worth of which was currently a matter of investigation; something called nova crystals, described as some kind of alternative currency where the Imperial credit was not accepted; a small quantity of a material called phrik…

It was obvious that the pirates had been rather busy, and the bounty hunter could only imagine that, not encompassed in the scope of the data he and Arden had received from their CorSec contact, there had been many more attacks, earlier than the three months the data had covered.

“So, you are the one that has my sister so unusually… bouncy,” a graceful, ice-cold voice broke through Harry’s musings, directly followed by a sharply whispered, “Winter!”

Returning his attention to the mirror, Harry saw a woman, around his and Leia’s age if he had to guess, but there was something about her that seemed… different. She sat on the Princess’ bed with an astounding poise and grace, some of which the young wizard could sometimes see in her adoptive sister, yet with her, it seemed less trained and much more a part of her actual being.

“Harry Potter,” he introduced himself. “Please, excuse my state of distraction. I was just going through an inventory of everything we seized when we nabbed a group of pirates here in the Corellian system.”

Winter, for that was her name, he knew, having heard enough about her from her sister, minutely inclined her head. Her whole demeanour gave Harry an impression of incredible stoicism, at least with people around who she did not yet know all that well.

“Winter Retrac,” she returned the greeting. “I wish we could talk more, but my duties call me away. Hopefully, I will get the chance to work with you in the future; as a member of the Alliance.”

Not missing her underhanded compliment, Harry inclined his head in a gesture he hoped would be considered contemplative before replying, “I hope to be able to do my best for the cause, whether that may be through joining, or something else entirely. Provided my crew agrees, of course. Good luck on your mission, Winter Retrac.”

The retreating image of Winter was soon replaced by Leia’s worried face, looking at him as if searching for any kind of discomfort.

“There’s no problem,” Harry assured her. “She’s kind of… intense, but she believes in her cause and does for it what she can; I appreciate that. Hey, can you tell me what phrik is?”

For a few seconds, there was no answer as Leia was obviously working through her shock at his simple acceptance of Winter’s uniqueness.

“Phrik is a rare metal alloy, one of the few materials known to be able to resist lightsabres,” she explained eventually. Then, the shoe dropped, “You found some?”

Harry nodded enthusiastically; a material resistant to lightsabres was exactly what he needed. Funny how things tended to work out sometimes.

“That’s great. I know Arden will be happy to hear it,” Leia commented. “By the way, the Alliance has hired that smuggler, Solo, for some secret mission.”

While the general revulsion in her voice was unmistakable, Harry thought he could hear a grudging respect there too, possibly acceptance. Not that it was unwarranted, really, from what Ben and Luke had told them about their flight from Tatooine. Then again, it was not Han’s skills that Leia had an issue with. Before the young wizard had much opportunity to comment, Mercer burst into his cabin.

“Boss,” the _Lightbringer’s_ first officer huffed, having obviously run to get to him quickly. “You’ve got to see this.”

Throwing the older man a glare and inclining his head toward the mirror in his hand, Harry replied, “Give me a minute, will you.” As Mercer made no move to leave, he added, “I’ll meet you outside.”

“Oh, such a casually commanding voice,” Leia teased after he had left the room. “Hot.”

Feeling the beginnings of a flush, Harry looked her into the eye. “Seems like I need to go,” he finally sighed. “Miss you.”

“Miss you too.”

OOOOOOOO

“You know I still haven’t shown Arden that stinging hex, so I still can make your life worse,” Harry reminded his first officer as they strode through the corridors of the pirate base to whatever incredibly important thing he needed to be shown right away.

“Aah, how dreamy,” the not all that much older Mercer commented. “To be young and in love again… ow!”

“Lest you forget,” the captain reminded him. “Keep your nose out of my business with Leia, unless you have the impression that your input is required to keep either of us from getting hurt.”

“Yes, Boss,” the former Imperial accepted, if reluctantly. “Does that mean you won’t show Arden the stinging hex?”

Harry pretended to ponder the question for a while before her replied, “Better I don’t. We both know she would start using it in her training, which is something literally no one would benefit from. Now, what was so important that you had to show me right away?”

“Right around the corner, Boss,” Mercer said evasively. “See, I found it odd that such a ragtag group of pirates would have a base like this, so I had everyone look around a bit while you were asleep. This is what we found.”

They were now standing inside the room the pirates had made their defence with the rotary blaster, but unlike before, the room was not simply a widening in the corridor; suddenly, through a door that must have been cleverly hidden before, it was now a T-intersection.

“I’ve had the team sweep it, no one inside,” Harry’s first officer said. “In fact, it looks as if no one has been in there in decades.”

He led them deeper into the structure, the badly maintained, and even worse cleaned corridors of the pirate base now replaced by a kind of drab grey that starkly reminded the wizard of the inside of Imperial installations. And yet, there was something off that told him it was definitely not a place having all that much to do with the Empire, at least not directly.

The two of them followed the even corridor until the first door that went away from it, which led them into a small armoury, blasters, as pistols, rifles and sharpshooter variants still hanging on the wall. Emblazoned on the back wall was a symbol, comprised of an eight-rayed star in black on white ground, surrounded by a dashed line. Similar enough to betray the connection it held to the Imperial crest, yet distinctly different.

“Clone Wars-era gear,” Mercer commented, oddly silent, as if observing some kind of mourning ritual. “We shot a few; just have to replace the power cells and gas cartridges and they still work.”

Leaving behind the armoury, they continued following the corridor for a while until they reached what looked like a central hub area. Through a door in the back wall, they reached some kind of command centre, the round room dominated by a holographic planning table, the likes of which Harry had seen the Rebels use and was also installed on the _Lightbringer_.

Yet, despite the undisturbed condition of everything, the hub area and the command centre were as empty as everything else they had seen, and it remained so as the two men returned to the central room.

“What’s through there?” Harry asked, pointing at a door in the left-hand wall as seen from the exit of the command centre.

“Just some quarters, a mess hall, some offices. Not all that interesting,” Mercer replied, instead turning his steps toward the other wall and the door there.

What he saw when they finally stepped through almost took the young wizard’s breath away; row upon row of prison cells rose in the round room, six stories high. In the middle of the huge space sat a single tower, the guard post on top shrouded in shadows. It was easy to see that whoever had been held prisoner here, would never quite have been able to know, whether they were being watched or not.

Harry could only imagine how easily that might have turned the prisoners into a nervous wreck.

“Some kind of secret prison?” he ventured, looking at his companion questioningly. “But why give it up?”

Mercer shook his head sadly, in deep resignation showing on his face. “Seems more like a black site to me. Not acknowledged in any kind of documentation, so it was probably just forgotten after it was abandoned. Otherwise this would be something the Empire would be interested in using.”

Despite how disturbing he found this conclusion, the younger man could not help but agree with his second-in-command’s analysis.

“I hope the Rebels know the kind of Republic they’re trying to restore and are willing to make some adjustments,” he commented, taking another long look around the rotunda. “This is of too much value to leave it unguarded. I need to contact Leia again.”

OOOOOOOO

Princess Leia Organa of the Royal House of Alderaan was inside an important Alliance High Command meeting when her communication mirror, the mirror she had gotten from Harry so they could stay in contact, started vibrating inside the pocket she had taken to carry it in. Usually, when either of them did not pick up for thirty seconds, the other would just assume that the time was not right, yet even at a minute, the polished glass and metal was still merrily buzzing away.

So, she pulled the enchanted piece out and answered it, shortly forgetting the rest of the Alliance higher-ups gathered all around her.

“Harry I’m in a command meeting,” Leia said, even as she noticed that all eyes were on her.

“Good,” came the surprising reply. “You’re going to want to know about this.”

After that, the young man who had found his way so firmly into her good graces told the Alliance officers about his findings inside the pirates’ asteroid base. To say that the former Republic senators their meeting included were shocked would have been a blatant understatement of the facts.

“…seems to have been left rather abruptly,” Harry finished his narration. “Good stock of weapons, even a few sets of armour that look like the precursors to what the stormtroopers wear. Even found some completely rotten food.”

From the beginning of the story, only the generals intimately involved in Alliance Intelligence had seemed to be more interested, fascinated even, with what was being said. The same kind of mood shone through as General Vernan started talking.

“Did you find anything else? Data plaques, unwiped computers…”

“Sorry to interrupt you, General,” Harry interjected. “The only thing that was done thoroughly when they left was erase every little piece of data, so that’s not the reason I contacted you. I called because I have a way of making this station almost completely untraceable, hide it so that the Imps could be flying all around it in their TIEs, even blaze the entire area of space in laser fire and it would not hurt that base.”

Had Harry not had everyone’s attention before he said that he certainly had it afterward.

“I have never heard of such a power,” Ben marvelled, looking at the younger man wide-eyed. “How does it work.”

“Ah, General Kenobi,” he greeted. “Didn’t see you there. I don’t completely understand how it does what it does, either. Some form of dimensional shift combined with powerful, mind-altering effects. Hopefully I’ll be able to learn what I need to know later, delving into the memories of my people.”

Of course, Leia was aware the explanation for his vast knowledge was far from true, but they had agreed to simply let people believe that it was another one of Harry’s skills.

“Why didn’t you do that to our starfighters?” General Dodonna asked, furiously. “All the while you were telling us about the dangers of the Empire looking through that optical camouflage thing, yet you could do something like that the entire time?”

“You are forgetting yourself, General,” the Princess, for in that moment, that was what she was, interceded. “Instead of being thankful you accuse our ally, not one of your subordinates of, deliberately holding out on us? Despite him not needing a reason for not sharing all the secrets of his people with us, I am sure Captain Potter still has one.”

Harry nodded, even as he was glaring at Dodonna; Leia knew him well enough by now that being accused of not helping where he could have would be considered a grave insult to him.

“Yes, as I’ve said before, the technology of my home did not really work well with high concentrations of Force energy around,” he explained, pointedly looking at the bearded general. “Since the defences against detection were strong enough the way they were, I wanted to get them done quickly, rather than sinking time into research. Now that we know that the things affected worst seem to be droid brains, and even those not to a debilitating effect, I can use a Fidelius here. And no, General Dodonna, I still can’t put it onto a starfighter, because it is not something you can just switch off, leaving your ships stranded without hyperspace navigation capabilities.”

Although he still looked somewhat pouty at being put down by two twenty-year-olds, Dodonna bowed his head to the small image of Harry.

“Please, forgive me Captain Potter. I am simply concerned for the men and women under my command,” the general said, actually sounding quite remorseful.

“And it is an attitude that gives you credit,” the wizard replied.

Out of the group, the ones salivating most intensely were the Intelligence officers, Vernan and Cracken, and Leia had a good idea what had them so interested; having a completely hidden base the enemy was unable to find, right in their backyard, too, would be pure gold for a spy. But beyond that, the ability for Alliance High Command to hide like that would be marvellous.

“Anyway, we will either have to wait here until the people who are supposed to pick up those two freighters come in, and then I can place the charm, or they need to be told the secret directly by the secret keeper, who would be me, or at least someone on the _Lightbringer_ ,” Harry explained. “How easy would it be to listen in on a call made by hyperspace transceivers or on the HoloNet?”

“We always assume anything that is routed through the HoloNet might be listened in on and bouncing a message from hyperspace transceiver to hyperspace transceiver can take days, often leaving the message garbled,” Vernan answered. “It can make reliable communication… difficult to achieve.”

“I thought as much,” the bounty hunter agreed. “So, I can’t include them that way… We’ll have to wait for those crews to arrive. Can you do anything to keep that arms trader safe for a bit longer?”

“We can tell him to move along the coast and into a cave, but that is only temporary,” Vernan responded, stroking his chin in thought. “Wroona is a hyperspace lane intersection, so the Empire has a sizable garrison on planet, and a repair yard in orbit. You would do well, not to be recognised if you want your cover to stay intact.”

“Will do,” Harry confirmed. “If you can, tell your pilots they have until evening in two days, then we’ll be gone, and no one I don’t tell will know, how to find this asteroid.”

“Understood, Captain Potter.”

OOOOOOOO

“Alright, people,” Harry addressed the gathered crew, standing as he was on the ramp leading down onto the hangar floor. “We’re going to be here for two days, waiting for the Alliance to send some people to pick up those freighters.”

A murmur went to the crowd at that pronunciation. “Those of you that aren’t wanted by the Empire are on shore leave, those that are… well, consider yourselves on abandoned creepy space station leave. Sorry, we’ll make it up to you when we’re a bit further away from the core. Arden will still be doing her drills, attendance will not be mandatory, though.”

Excited chatter went through the crew at the idea of shore-leave, although there were sympathetic looks all around to those, who would not be able to come.

“We’ve captured Clone Wars-era weaponry, as you’ve seen, and a lot of stuff from the pirates,” Harry continued his address. “We’re going to hand over most of it to the Alliance, but each and every member of the crew may take one piece, either for its value in combat or as an antiquity, under two conditions: one, these weapons can’t be sold, we don’t want them getting into undeserving hands. Two, if you find any personal effects, you will hand them in so they can be given to the prisoners. These people might be criminals, but that doesn’t mean they don’t have any rights. Is that clear?”

“Yes, sir,” the combined voices of the crew echoed through the hangar.

“Good,” the captain declared. “The _Lightbringer_ leaves at 0700 in the morning, we’ll hand in our prisoners and you’ll get your share before shore leave really starts.”

OOOOOOOO

“That Potter guy certainly is something else,” General Vernan opined, sitting across from Cracken in the mess hall at Massassi Station. “Did you hear that the soldiers have taken to calling his ship ‘The Academy’?”

“I’d heard, but don’t really know, why,” Cracken replied.

A smile on his face filled to the brim with schadenfreude, Vernan explained, “Comes from their schedule. Before they got out of range for direct communication, a few members of the crew called friends and family on the base. They have hand-to-hand training every day, shooting three days a week, and whatever else in special skills they have been able to scrounge up among the crew. I can tell you that at least one among them is an expert slicer, very willing to share her talents.”

Cracken’s eyes grew wide at that description. “Give them a few months, they’ll have turned rookies into special forces soldiers,” he commented. “Alright, maybe not to those extremes, but when they return, any unit would be lucky to get anyone who learned on that ship.”

The other general nodded in complete agreement. “When they come back, we should have one of our Infiltrators ready to join them,” he proposed. “Have someone there to teach demolitions and stealth. Think we can get him to take on some more soldiers…”


	17. Ideological Differences

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: The Star Wars and Harry Potter copyrights lie with their respective owners, should any of them have any problem with my story being shared, I will comply with their wishes and remove it from circulation.  
> Please do not copy this work or any part of it.

“And their base was destroyed?” the CorSec captain who had come to the spaceport to pick up the captured pirates confirmed with the young bounty hunter; Harry could see the woman did not fully believe him, and neither did she particularly like bounty hunters.

“Yes, one of them was hiding in some hole, blew up the reactor,” he replied, something the officer he was talking to seemed to believe. “Also, these are all the non-weapon items we found on them. Had to take them away in case any of it had any _hidden_ features, but I don’t see a reason why they should not be in your evidence lockup.”

With something approaching thankfulness, maybe even a tiny sliver of gratitude, the captain handed over the credit chip with the sum of 244505 credits already loaded onto it. Though he was already dreading the transaction fees, Harry would have to find a local bank that was able to give out more and smaller chips… maybe, the investment into a chip reader could be beneficial. After all, allowing them to move around charge from small data stick to small data stick without having to rely on some overly greedy money-pushers, paying hefty sums for the ‘service’ of simply transferring data from one storage device to another sounded like a good idea when paying out shares of bounties was going to be a regular occurrence in the future.

“Excuse me,” he stopped one of the dockworkers milling all around the landing site, gaping at the sleek black _Lightbringer_. “Do you know where I would be able to find someone to sell me one of those credit chip readers. I want to pay my crew but paying some nerf-herder for transferring credits from chip to chip sounds like a real waste of money.”

The dockworker looked at him sympathetically; yes, it rang true, obviously. Bankers were seldom well-liked, and in both the realities Harry had known it seemed.

“You have a datapad with a map?” the man asked, gesturing for the bounty hunter to hand it over. Seeing the hesitance displayed by the younger man, the worker added, “I just saw you deliver almost thirty pirates to CorSec. How stupid would I have to be to try and steal your datapad?”

Looking at the pad Harry was now handing over, he added, “Not that I would try and steal _that_ anyway.”

With a grin and a few taps, the man added two navpoints to the map Harry had gotten on the HoloNet.

“The first one is for an electronics store; they should have what you need, and maybe you can replace this travesty,” he held up the datapad. “The second one is my favourite diner. Tell them Lac sent you, ask for the recommendation, you won’t regret it.”

With a grateful thanks, the pair (only Harry and Arden that day, as Mercer was painting speeders, while Corsek and Javoc had declined to do Merlin knew what, though it probably involved shooting at thinh) hailed a speeder cab and, after showing the driver where they wanted to go, went off.

When finally, they reached the inside of the store Lac had sent them to, Harry was momentarily stunned; subconsciously, he had expected something similar to the used speeder lot they had bought their speeders at. Instead, he entered what he had often imagined a sci-fi world might look like when he was younger. Everything had flowing lines, the staff was clothed in white, the room was light and airy and the décor almost blindingly bright. Quickly, they were picked out by one of the members of the sales staff, a brightly smiling young woman in a white jumpsuit.

“Hello, welcome to Erva Electronics. I am Ammuneel, your service rep,” she greeted the two with such obviously false cheeriness it was honestly cringeworthy. “How can I help you today?”

“Hello Ammuneel, I’m Vincent,” Harry returned the greeting with (he hoped) much more subdued and believable friendliness. “I’m looking to get a new datapad; I’ve recently been told mine is rather out of date. And I want to acquire a device to transfer data between credit chips to pay out my crew.”

Faux Bubbly smiled at him widely and led him and Arden over to a long line of devices. “Then you have come to exactly the right place,” she announced cheerily, pointing down the shelves filled with electronics of undefined uses. “We have models with and without a HoloNet uplink to connect to the banks and all our products come with a warranty of one standard year already included, unless you leave the planet with them.”

“Yeah, it’s not exactly the kind of work where I want to have a bank uplink on my ship,” Harry commented and, seeing her forced smile falter for a bit to be replaced by a look of fear, he rushed to explain, “I’m a bounty hunter, mostly violent criminals. Without a HoloNet uplink will be fine. Just something you can put two credit chips inside and transfer some currency. Something rugged, if possible, so it doesn’t break the first time someone shoots at our ship.”

Now more fascinated than scared and after looking around furtively, Ammuneel leaned closer to Harry and whispered, “Are you the ones that took out these pirates? The stories have been going around like wildfire since yesterday that a group of bounty hunters would deliver them to CorSec today.”

The young bounty hunter nodded, not exactly sure what this had to do with it.

“Thank you,” the sales-rep said simply. “My brother is supposed to take a shipment of electronics along the Corellian run tomorrow, so he would have flown directly through their hunting grounds from what I hear.”

Throwing another furtive glance around the room, she continued, “Look, I’m supposed to sell you the newest, most expensive model, but we’ve had complaints that these are rather… finnicky. Believe me, the CredFlow IIIs are better than the IVs. Maybe a bit slower, but it only costs half as much and it is so much sturdier. Just tell me exactly what you want, loudly, so my manager doesn’t get suspicious.”

Harry winked at the young woman, although it felt strange, seeing as he usually never did it. Still, he felt like the situation called for it.

“I would like to buy a CredFlow III,” he declared with an almost booming voice, drawing the attention of the previously mentioned, and now rather annoyed looking, manager.

“Are you sure, Vincent,” Ammuneel replied, actually surprising Harry with her acting skills. She was rather believable if she really had her heart in it, it seemed. “The CredFlow IV has an increase in computation speed of almost 10%, making credit transfers go so much smoother.”

“No, the CredFlow III is exactly what I want,” the bounty hunter declared with finality, hoping it would end this charade. “Now, I also need a new datapad.”

That seemed to mollify the manager, who returned his attention to chastising another employee of his. Meanwhile, Ammuneel had led them over to a row of long tables, filled to the brim with datapads, both sleek and sturdy, as well as some relevant accessories.

“Now, Vincent, what do you need your pad for?” the saleswoman asked, actually sounding as if she wanted to give him her honest opinion this time, now that they were out of her supervisor’s scrutiny.

“Something to read on, use the HoloNet, maybe organise tasks more efficiently than I can at the moment,” the captain picked off the internal notes he had made earlier. “Oh, and a holo emitter and recording equipment might be nice, should we come into the situation of having to claim a bounty dead, rather than alive.”

At his description, a wide smile split the sales-rep’s face and she went over to a group of pads all designed in a similar fashion.

“This time I actually can, with good conscious, recommend the newest thing,” she explained, picking up a sleek grey pad, lying there next to what looked like a bracelet. “The Pocket Assistant Mark III. It was built on the Assistant Mark II, obviously, based on the old Pocket Secretary. Gentik and MicroData put their heads together to build a pad with an inbuilt droid brain. The power cells don’t hold all that long, really, but there’s a field version mainly intended for law enforcement and independent scouts that comes with a protective hull and extra power packs.”

Intrigued by the description, Harry pointed toward the bracelet he had seen earlier. “What’s that?”

“That’s the holo unit,” Ammuneel responded. “With the miniaturised droid brain inside, there was no room for the camera, audio pickups and projectors in the pad itself, so MicroData decided to market it as a feature, instead. It’s linked to the tablet itself, the range’s around thirty metres, give or take. You can holo-call someone and wander away from your tab without the connection breaking.”

Convinced that this might be exactly what he had been looking for, Harry threw a glance at the price advertised on a small display next to the exhibition and winced. 400 credits, plus another 50 for the field version. Sure, it was a drop in the ocean, compared to what they had earned on the last job, or even to what they had sunk into acquiring vehicles, but still. Just spending that much money only for himself, somehow felt unduly indulgent. Then, he had flash of inspiration.

“Say, what would your manager say about giving me a volume discount?”

OOOOOOOO

“You bought _forty_ datapads?” the Leia inside the mirror asked incredulously. “You don’t even have that many people on your ship.”

Harry shrugged. “You told me people wanted to come onto the ship, supposedly because of the training they’d be getting here,” he replied nonchalantly. “I had a feeling we would get some… reinforcements, the next time we’re around the base.”

The young woman on the other end of the mirror-call giggled lightly, a sound that felt incredibly alien from her. “It’s cute you think that forty will be enough,” she commented amusedly. “I hear Vernan and Cracken are already debating how to get you to take as many people on that ship as it can hold.”

With a groan, Harry decided that he would rather be talking about literally anything else. So, he did.

“How’s Solo behaving?”

Immediately, the coifed, gently teasing expression vanished from Leia’s face, replaced as it had been by a reflection of her distaste for the smuggler and mercenary.

“An insufferable flirt,” she complained. “Arrogant, too full of himself, cocksure; pick something. To his benefit, without a bounty hanging over his head he is less fixated on money.”

“I’m…” Harry began, not really sure how he would finish. “Happy to hear that, I suppose. Luke and the old man?”

This actually made the princess smile again. “Luke has backed off,” she reported happily. “He still sometimes looks at me weirdly, but it seems more like he is… I don’t know… he looks like he is trying to figure something out.”

For a second, the weird emotional flicker he had once seen on Kenobi’s face came to Harry’s mind. He asked himself whether the two could be linked, before discarding the idea again. These small snippets of emotion being so meaningful, and all were something that happened in books, not in real life. Then again, a lot of his life had been more like a weird fantasy book.

“I think Kenobi might know more about the two of you than he lets on,” the young wizard finally relayed his thoughts. “Remember when I was working on that Y-wing and you activated that rune array?”

Mirror-Leia raised an eyebrow; it was rather expressive, Harry decided, especially for such a small gesture.

“You mean when I almost blew us all up?” she asked rhetorically.

“Yes, that,” he confirmed. “The way Kenobi looked at you and Luke when we found out you could learn magic and use of the Force… he didn’t look scared, or worried, but I can’t describe it any better than that, either.”

For a while, the two of them fell silent, simply basking in each other’s magically transmitted presence and thinking of what else they wanted to speak about.

“I’ll ask Ben,” Leia finally announced confidently, though her countenance belied that attitude.

“Please wait,” Harry bade her, earnestly and with conviction. “I’ve had such a secret held over me before, and you’re going to want to have some emotional support when you learn whatever this is. I’d like to be there for you.”

She mulled his plea over for a few moments, before nodding reluctantly. “I’ll wait,” the princess allowed. “But the next time we’re all in the same place, we’ll be finding out what’s going on. Also…”

She had begun saying something, but never really finished; for what reason, Harry did not know, but she looked decidedly unhappy. A few steeling breaths had her back on track soon, though.

“I don’t want to stay with Ben and Luke anymore,” Leia finally said. “My Jedi training is not going all that well, and every time I try using the Force, I remember how much more natural interacting with your magic felt. Luke’s taking to it like a fish in the water, but me…”

“I understand,” Harry replied, trying to mask his happiness so as not to lead her decision in any way. “What about the Alliance? Don’t they need you for… what is it you do for the Rebellion, exactly?”

“Whatever I am needed for,” she replied testily. “I think I could convince Mon, Dodonna and the others as long as we keep doing, what you’re already doing. You’ve already found us a secret hidey-hole in the enemy’s backyard, after all, as well as shiploads full of recruits and weapons.

Hearing that she would not be putting her duties in jeopardy, not that he ever really thought she would, Harry finally allowed the wide smile that had been waiting to spread on his face to do exactly that.

“In that case, you’ll be welcome aboard.”

OOOOOOOO

“Helmsman, set course for Wroona,” Harry ordered the officer who was manning the _Lightbringer’s_ steering controls when they were finally ready to depart. Only two hours before the deadline he had set, the skeleton crews for the two freighters as well as the station had arrived, allowing the wizard to let those who needed to know in on the secret of the Fidelius-hidden base.

The freighter crews, who had not needed to know, had been shocked rather effectively when two ships had appeared, seemingly out of nothing. Still, for the purpose of any future secret-divulging, he had left behind a second communication mirror, allowing him to let in anyone who needed to know.

“Yes, Captain,” the former Imperial acknowledged, and Harry’s corvette eased out of the hangar of the Rebellion’s new base, closely followed by the _Morningstar_. “ETA three days, twelve hours.”

Already on his way down to the training room, the captain thanked the helmsman, trying to keep his own muttering low enough not to be overheard by his crew. “Let’s just hope that’s quick enough for our weapons dealer.”

By the time he reached the almost legendary, if also dreaded location where Arden and several of the Alliance special forces soldiers regularly treated the crew to a gruelling exercise in what they had yet to learn, he was in a much better mood already. If Leia said she could convince someone, there was little question in his mind that she most definitely could; that meant, in not too distant a future, the fierce, intelligent and beautiful princess would be with him on the _Lightbringer_.

He was almost giddy at the thought.

However, at least part of that giddiness was replaced by consternation when, unlike their usual travelling schedule, he did not find Arden waiting for him in the training room, staff in hand, ready to give him a good thrashing. Instead, he got a message on the datapad contained in a pouch at his uniform’s belt, which he quickly opened on the bracelet’s holographic display.

_“Hey, Boss, I’m in the cargo hold with Mercer, Corsek and Javoc. Had an idea.”_

Shrugging, Harry turned his steps to the cargo bay located adjacent to the hangar, where the crew had put away the loot from their pirate-hunting mission. What awaited him there was the original team he had put together for the _Morningstar_ , all standing around the crate filled with what the inventory manifest had called ‘phrik’, the material supposedly resistant to lightsabres.

“Hey, Boss,” Mercer greeted and, seeing Harry’s questioning look, shrugged. “Don’t know why I’m here, either. Just got a message from Arden saying I should come.”

Just about managing not to snicker at how willingly the much older man had followed that command, the wizard turned his look onto the Dathomirian.

“When you told me about this stuff resisting lightsabres, I remembered something some of my sisters were able to do,” the witch explained while pulling an ingot of the refined material out of the crate. “Some of us were able to strengthen common materials in such a way, that they could resist these weapons just as well. These women were obviously sought after, their teachings coveted. I myself never learned it.”

Without warning, she threw the ore at Harry, who managed to catch it just before the trajectory it had been flying in would have made him a soprano. However, that was soon forgotten, as he felt… he did not know how exactly to describe it, but he felt something from the material that vaguely reminded him of his wand, if much less strong. Still, it was just as right.

“I can use this to make a new wand,” he marvelled, already gripping into the deceptively small pouch mounted on his belt, opposite the holster for his datapad. “Accio crystals.”

What flew into his hand was a momentary disappointment, Harry had to admit. The once whole and beautiful crystal had shattered into three pieces; yet, as he looked at them, the wizard noted that none of the three pieces had suffered in their perfection, each still completely clear, each still thrumming in the Force… or magic, or whatever. Wordlessly, he handed one over to Arden who took it almost reverently.

Then, she immediately handed it back over, looking almost disgusted.

“Sorry,” she shuddered. “That just felt… completely wrong somehow. I’ll have to find something for myself, it seems. Hey, is there a reason for you to have only one focus? You do have three crystals, and you already know how to cast with a staff, but something shorter would be helpful when you’re using a gun.”

Harry stared at the three crystal parts lying on his flat hand once again. One long, thin sliver; one shorter, more bulbous shard; one wedge, formerly the middle part of the crystal and biggest of the three. Yes, something told him that he should make three foci.

A ring, a wand, a staff.

A ring, a wand and a staff.

It had a nice ring to it, he had to admit.

OOOOOOOO

Harry was sitting in his room, staring at the materials for his new magical tools. The last time he had sat somewhere, staring at something he wanted to craft with, delving into his borrowed memories had given him the answer, but he just knew it would not work, this time.

He already knew _how_ to do what he wanted to do, had done it before, after all. He was just unsure what he was aiming for.

Frustrated after staring at the pieces of material arrayed before him for almost three hours, and also with quite a bit of pressure on his bladder (three hours’ worth of it), he let himself fall back onto the bed, legs still intertwined from his cross-legged concentration. With a sigh, he arose and trotted over to the refresher unit, hoping that relieving that accursed pressure would allow him to concentrate once again.

Then, he remembered the back-then only mildly interesting lessons on the Force he had listened in on while Kenobi had been travelling on the _Morningstar_ , and how much they had reminded him of what he had to do to access the memories locked away inside his head. Or learn occlumency, for that matter. So, after cleaning his hands, he walked back to the bed, cleared off everything but the three crystal shards, sat down and tried grappling with his old nemesis once again: emptying his mind.

It felt like only minutes had passed when, with a suddenness that had Harry jump in fright, if not literally then surely figuratively, the interloper that had breached his door had to jump back to avoid the powerful stunner that had sailed their direction.

“What the hell, Boss,” Mercer complained. “I just came to tell you dinner was ready.”

Shaking his head to clear the cobwebs away, the wizard turned to look at the watch on his wall, which indeed showed the time as 1803 hours. He had been meditating, as Kenobi had called it, for two hours.

“Sorry, Mercer,” he said groggily, creaking his knees as he slowly worked his way up to a standing position. “I was… suppose I was meditating.”

Harry could tell that his first officer was not particularly impressed by that explanation but did not seem to want to push it further.

“Sure, Jedi stuff,” the former Imperial commented, without really saying anything. “Fascinating and all, but I notice that it was not _the Force_ that destroyed Alderaan. And the more I think about it, the less I think the Jedi are that good of an idea. I mean sure, if they want to look for a planet for themselves to practice their religion in peace, no problem. Such a stringent order, you could even call them a cult, in charge of other people’s lives though?”

The man shuddered a little, clearly uncomfortable with the thought of it. “From what I’ve learned by myself and heard from Kenobi, their religious disputes have cost billions, maybe trillions of lives.”

Saddened at the thought of so much loss due to the megalomaniacal ravings of what was essentially another side of the coin that were the Jedi, Harry simply shook his head, silently. Sure, evil people would always do evil things, and good people tended to do good, even though he was acutely aware that things were seldom that black and white. Yet, the practices of the old Jedi order had appalled him as he had questioned Kenobi on them. Taking children away from their parents, by force if need be? Forbidding any worldly attachments?

Given all that, Harry was not surprised that the Emperor had been able to first mark out the Jedi as evil, before having them fade into the blackness of time. If the new order Kenobi was likely out to build wanted to have any hope of future relevance, it would probably have to do a lot of things differently.

“Believe me, I won’t be a Jedi. Not now, not anytime,” the wizard declared proudly. “I’m a wizard, and I would like to think that I can make up my own mind and do not need my morals dictated by… what did Solo call it?”

“A hokey religion,” Mercer supplied helpfully. “Thanks for the reassurance, Boss. Don’t get me wrong, I’ll take the Jedi over those Sith enemies of theirs any day, but something about them still gives me the creeps. That ‘no emotion’ stuff is just plain wrong.”

“Oh, yes, on that we can definitely agree,” Harry commented. “Very unhealthy; believe me, I’m an expert in repressing emotion, especially anger. Somehow that never turns out all that well.”

Both now laughing, the two of them made their way along the corridors and turbolifts until they reached the now almost empty mess hall. Only a few crewmembers were still around, some of them sitting around one of the new datapads and cheering over something they were watching on the HoloNet. If Harry had to guess, he would have said they were enjoying some kind of sporting event.

“Great, you found him,” Arden snarked as the two sat down at their usual table. “Corsek and Javoc wanted to get in some more time on the range with their new guns; those two really love their toys, don’t they? What took you so long?”

“We had a civilised discussion on our ideological differences with the Jedi we thought needed addressing in the future,” Harry declared pompously, overplaying it to such a degree that not even he himself believed it.

“Sure,” the witch replied sarcastically. “Did someone get cursed?”

“Mercer,” the wizard replied with a grin. “Managed to jump out of the way, though. Better like that, really; he surprised me, and that stunner was overpowered.”

Arden nodded magnanimously, wearing a satisfied smile. “Next time, hit. Makes for a better story.”

Under Mercer’s affronted watch, Harry nodded equally as magnanimously. “I’ll do my best.”

“Any luck in getting yourself a new focus?”

In between sentences, they were all now eating, leaving all of them rather curt in their patterns of speech.

“I know how to get there. Should have something by the time we reach Wroona.”

“Good.”

“Why should I be the one hit with a stunner?”

“Because you seem intent on barging into _my_ room.”

“He does that with you, too? And here I thought you liked me, Mercer.”

“Maybe he plays for both sides.”

“Like flying on both sides of the speederlane?”

“Why did I join you again?”

“Because you wanted off the Death Star.”

“Oh, right.”

“And we’ve grown on you.”


	18. Promotion Party

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: The Star Wars and Harry Potter copyrights lie with their respective owners, should any of them have any problem with my story being shared, I will comply with their wishes and remove it from circulation.  
> Please do not copy this work or any part of it.

Working on his new weapons, and more importantly two new parts of his very being, did indeed take Harry almost until the _Lightbringer_ reached the planet of Wroona. The weapons merchant the Alliance had asked them to help out had in the past repeatedly supplied Rebel field teams with the weapons they needed, and advanced ones at that.

It was 2300 hours shipboard time when the wizard finally had an image in his mind of what he wanted his two smaller foci to look like. One, the wand, was simply put a rod; sure, it would have a handle and some ornamentation, but a rod just was its basic shape. Had it been made of wood rather than metal he would have felt confident in calling it a stick.

After all, it was a wand, and wands were glorified sticks.

The other piece was a little more unusual, though. From his initial idea of a simple ring, the design had just evolved, now involving a hinge and a latch allowing him to affix the tube of metal to his left or right index finger. It was even flat enough to be worn under the body-glove that was part of their redesigned stormtrooper armour.

Now to making it.

Just like he had done with his first staff in this strange new world he had found himself in, Harry reached for the crystal shard and the metal ingot with his mind and magic, simply willing them into obeying his command. Now that he was aware, the wandless casting came almost ridiculously easy, even if it lacked both the finesse and power achievable by using a focus. Before his eyes, the supposedly indestructible metal bent to his will, liquefying at the touch of his magic and enveloping the clear crystal in an embrace impossible to shatter. From that start, he worked on to form the narrow shape of a wand, adding a handle just the right size for his hand, both the base and the top of which flared out decoratively.

Without having noticed it, Harry had spent almost an hour on his ‘little project’ as he realised when looking at the clock in his wall. Shortly, he debated whether possibly sinking another hour in his second creation of the evening was a particularly good plan, yet eventually his more impulsive side won out.

Once again, he let himself sink into the feeling of his magic and began shaping the phrik alloy. Half an hour later, a smile on his face and two foci in his hands, Harry Potter fell asleep.

OOOOOOOO

Wroona, as seen from orbit, was an inordinately blue world. It was also rather small, although the gravity was still close to standard, due to it also being a rather dense world. Geologically speaking, not in referral to any of its natives. With the planet they were hoping to land on having much less traffic than Corellia, they were on the ground barely twenty minutes after their arrival in orbit, which suited Harry just fine, being on a time-sensitive mission and all. Even the dockworkers had let them go without incident after unsuccessfully trying to coax out the story behind a civilian owning a Raider corvette.

However, when the group of Harry, Arden, Mercer, Javoc and Corsek finally reached Palestro’s Wholesale Firearms, they found only an Imperial Army trooper standing guard before an obviously ransacked shop.

“What happened here?” the captain asked the young man, probably a conscript, standing guard.

The guard looked him up and down, before replying, “What’s it to you? You seem plenty armed for a civilian, already.”

“Bounty hunter,” Harry replied without missing a beat. “Pirates, violent gangs, that kind of thing. I need all the firepower I can get for me and my team. So, can you tell us what happened here?”

With a glance to the team Harry had mentioned, the trooper checked that they indeed did look like they were used to being heavily armed.

“Alien scum was helping the Rebellion,” he finally told them. “Giving those terrorists weapons to kill our guys with. Fled up north, but we’ll have him soon enough.”

Throwing the trooper a small salute, the bounty hunter led his core crew away, striding confidently toward the landing bay where they had parked the _Lightbringer_. The Imperials already knowing of Palestro’s association with the Alliance was a foreseen, yet rather unfortunate complication in their efforts to extract the Wroonian trader.

“Arden, can you find out if there’s a bounty on the guy’s head?” Harry asked the witch, who promptly pulled out her datapad and began searching the listings for the planet.

“Are you going to hand him over to the Empire?” Corsek asked, shock written clearly on his face. “I thought we didn’t do that?”

Harry looked at him darkly in return. “Frankly I’m insulted you’d ask,” he replied. “No, but if there’s a bounty on Palestro’s head, then as bounty hunters, we have a legitimate reason for looking for him, should someone ask. Arden, how does it look?”

The Dathomirian witch was looking at the holographic picture of a blue-skinned humanoid (or near-human? Harry found it hard to follow, sometimes), the bounty on his head noted as 5000 credits.

“Huh, that’s not all that much,” the wizard commented. “Not the kind of bounty an operation of our size would usually take, right?”

Looking at Mercer, Harry raised an eyebrow in question. “No,” his first officer replied. “That’s a bounty a novice bounty hunter would go after. We might only have two under our belts, but any normal bounty hunting team with our resources wouldn’t even take a second look at this one.”

“So, we should make sure we’re not seen snooping around,” the captain concluded. “Mercer, I want those droids of yours scouting out the coast to the north. Caves, abandoned structures, everything someone could hide in.”

With a nod, the Imperial deserter started tapping around on his pad, and even as the group reached the ramp into the vehicle bay of the _Lightbringer_ , the probe droids he had bought on Corellia were hovering out.

“Arden, I’ll disillusion you,” Harry then turned to the witch. “I’d like you to keep an eye on the Imperial garrison. If anything big starts happening there, I want to know.”

“Aye, Boss,” she replied with a cheeky salute. “I’ll get my gear.”

“Mercer, as soon as you have those droids underway, take Javoc and Corsek, and paint over our symbols on those speedervans and the bikes,” he continued. “I’ll ask Leia to allow us to use the Alliance starbird for this mission.”

Even while Mercer looked at him rather dubiously, Arden was grinning widely. “You’ll just confirm everything they’ve been thinking already,” the Dathomirian warrior enthused. “Elegant subterfuge.”

“Anyone care to fill us in?” Javoc interjected. “Arden might have been planning ambushes and traps since she was probably way too young, but we haven’t.”

“Of course,” Harry replied, grinning widely. “Suppose a known Rebel agent is suddenly rescued by a group of bounty hunters? That wouldn’t be good for those bounty hunters, right? Instead, we will give these Imperials exactly what they will be expecting: Alliance forces breaking out a Rebel sympathiser.”

OOOOOOOO

“Damn it, they already found him,” Mercer cursed loudly as he looked at the video feed transmitted by one of the scouting droids he had sent out. “But… why is there a firefight?”

Indeed, the feed was showing what seemed to be an intense firefight between a squad of Imperial Army soldiers and someone inside a cave, whom the camera was unable to pick up. Even as they were watching, a small object flew out of the mouth of the cave, landing between the troopers’ feet and scattering them, just before the explosion ripped a crater where they had just been standing.

“Why is there just one scout squad?” the captain asked his crew, not at all understanding why the Imperials would not call in backup if there was such fierce resistance. “Sure, an armoured vehicle would be at a severe disadvantage in one of these caves, but a heavy repeating blaster would definitely help them out.”

Mercer chuckled a little. “This is not actually live footage,” he explained. “It’s around five minutes old. The droid had to leave the area around the caves to get out of the full spectrum jamming someone set up. See those speeder bikes?”

Harry looked at the line of ten bikes, all of them properly grounded, and not in their usual wating position. From what Javoc and Corsek had told him, if these soldiers expected a fight, they would have left the repulsorlifts running.

“Exactly,” the former Imperial officer said, watching Harry’s eyes flick first to the row of bikes and then their two former Army members. “Looks like someone jury-rigged a repulsorlift jammer. Kind of limits our methods of approach. At least we know it doesn’t go out all that far, maybe a hundred metres, otherwise we would have lost the recon droid.”

Now understanding the scouts’ determination in their attack, Harry simply verbalised his conclusion, “And because, as far as these soldiers are concerned, the repulsorlift and comms jamming could go out for miles, they haven’t sent someone out on foot, because they have no idea, how many people could be holed up in that cave. Helmsman.”

“Yes, sir,” the young officer at the helm controls replied.

“Bring us down north of those caves, absolutely avoid being seen,” the captain ordered, getting a quick salute, palm down, like a British seaman. Much as it annoyed him, Harry had introduced the gesture as a means of inducing group loyalty among his crew, and people seemed to take to it.

Pressing the button that allowed him to use the PA system, he continued, “Everyone to combat stations. Combat personnel, gear up to look as much like Alliance members as possible and meet in the vehicle bay in five. Potter out.”

With everyone helping each other, it was really only five minutes later that Harry and the others, except Mercer and Arden, were ready inside the speeder van or on the multiple bikes, wearing either the transfigured stormtrooper armour (in the case of Harry, Javoc and Corsek) or the less elaborate armour sets they had been given by the Alliance.

“Alright everyone,” the captain said over the intercom. “We’ll park the speeders around 150 metres away from the enemy, so we don’t run a risk of wrecking once we cross into that jamming field. Around half a click out, we will lose radio connection, so have your navigation systems set, don’t rely on your comrades to tell you when to stop. As soon as we’re on the ground, proceed to the caves. I want to be in and out of there as quickly as possible, with no casualties. That means live blaster fire for the soldiers, and if it becomes necessary, we stun Palestro and apologise later. Any questions?”

When none came, Harry signalled for the driver of the speedervan to get going, and they were soon surrounded by a swarm of bikes covering their advance. With the incredible speed these repulsorlift vehicles tended to display, it took them only minutes to cover the twenty kilometres between their actual target and where the helmsman had set down the _Lightbringer_.

As the group left behind their rides, they quickly formed up into a broad line, allowing them to maximise the amount of firepower they would be able to bring to bear. However, that turned out to be very much unnecessary, for as soon as they reached the vicinity of the caves, they could see that the battle they had come to fight was almost over. Only a single member of the scout squadron remained and he had taken to running away; obviously, it had seemed a better idea to run and face the penalty the Empire deemed appropriate for abandoning one’s post, than to face whatever was waiting inside that cave.

Naturally, that made the troops under Harry’s command rather nervous, an attitude that was only compounded when the fleeing enemy crumpled to the ground in the midst of one leaping step, felled by only a single shot to the back of his chest.

“Sharpshooter!” Javoc called out, prompting all the soldiers to duck into a crouch, even as the wizard among them drew his wand into his left hand (the right was occupied by a pistol) and raised a strong shield in front of him.

“Form up behind me,” he ordered the soldiers, who moved to comply with surprising speed, given their crouch positions. Then again, they had seen their captain hold off fire from a rotary blaster for a good deal of time before.

The group, now huddled behind Harry’s shield, even though no more fire seemed to be incoming, quickly moved up onto the mouth of the cave.

“This is Captain Potter, I’m with the Alliance,” Captain Potter called into the cave; he had decided to go with his ‘Rebel name’, given that he was wearing his Alliance-style armour. “We’re here to extract a merchant by the name of Palestro.”

“Ah, so you’re our ride out of here,” commented the voice of a Bothan, who proceeded to step out of the shadows with a swagger that belied his short stature; if the wizard had to guess, he would say even Leia would tower over this one by at least twenty centimetres. “Took you long enough.”

Already Harry could hear grumbling among the ranks of his crew, most of it coming not from the single former Imperial who was now distastefully inspecting the bloodbath that had once been a scout squad, but from those who Harry knew to be Alliance special forces members.

“Ungrateful spooks, getting in trouble and not appreciating those who get them out of it,” he could hear Gur mutter with a healthy smattering of annoyance that made the Bothan’s face bristle the way Harry had once seen a cat do when it did not want to be disturbed, yet someone insisted on doing so.

“Gur, behave,” the captain chastised his man, before turning his attention to the duster-wearing man who had approached them. “And you, we’re risking our cover to get you out of here. A bit of gratitude would be nice. Now deactivate those jamming devices so we can get our transport in place.”

With little to no posturing, the Bothan (who, as Harry noticed in annoyance, had still not introduced himself) swaggered back into the cave, quickly followed by the young wizard. What he found inside that cave was both somewhat awe-inspiring and discouraging.

“The trader refused to leave without his stock,” a human woman, around thirty to forty, if Harry had to guess, explained the chaos. In the back of the large cavern stood the two devices that had both severely hamstrung the Empire’s response as well as the ability of the rescue team to come in. While the bounty hunter watched calmly, a blue-skinned man, otherwise looking just like a human, flicked a switch first on one, then on the second. As soon as the second switch had been flicked, the commlink indicator inside his helmet began blinking ominously.

“This is Potter,” Harry accepted the call.

 _“Harry, whatever you’re doing, do it quickly,”_ the voice of Arden wafted through the connection and into his ear. _“I just saw the base launch two of those Imperial gunships, the ones that look a bit like ours. They were headed in your direction.”_

“Copy that, Arden,” the captain replied, already in motion. “Javoc, Corsek, Gur, Sestac, Morquen, you get the speeders here. We got IDTs on the way, and I want to be gone when they arrive.”

The group around the overly self-assured Bothan did not seem too bothered by suddenly being ordered to move by a new commander, so Harry turned to them next. “How many of you are there?”

“Eight, including Beeth over there,” the human woman explained, pointing at the unlikable Bothan. “What is the plan?”

“I’ll contact my ship, they’ve landed twenty clicks away,” the young man explained. “Our cover in the Empire is important, so we won’t be leaving behind anyone who can identify us, and my people will be coming in under full-spectrum jamming.”

Just as he was finished talking, the whir of repulsorlifts could be heard outside, the particular thrum of the speedervan giving the vehicles away as friendlies.

“I want everyone who can to take one of the bikes, the rest gets into the van,” he continued to order, looking around for any dissenters. “It’ll give them more targets to shoot at. Palestro…”

“Y-yes?” the blue-skinned man, who had begun hoarding his stock in his arms turned to look at him.

“We don’t have time to take everything,” he said, without any kind of give in his tone. “You can take the most important things, as much as you can carry, the rest we’ll have to destroy.”

Seeing the horrified look on the man’s blue face, Harry added, “Would you rather die, or have the Empire get a hold of your stock?”

Emphatically shaking his head, the Wroonian dropped the myriad pieces of merchandise already in his grasp and proceeded to gather what he had been allowed to take.

“ _Lightbringer_ , this is Potter, we have enemies incoming and need you at our position,” Harry then contacted Mercer over his helmet’s comm system. “As soon as we’re done talking, I want you to engage that jamming device we have onboard.”

_“Aye-aye, Boss. We’re already on our way.”_

OOOOOOOO

Lieutenant Nared, garbed in the field officer armour befitting his rank, stood behind the pilots of his lead gunship, fantasising about the lucky day he was having. The opportunity to take out a Rebel sympathiser was not one to be had every day, and whatever the piece of alien scum had used to defend himself against the scout squadron that had not fulfilled their pre-scheduled call-in was surely now spent. Even if it was not, he had a complement of two line and two heavy weapons squads with him.

Oh, this would be such a boost to his career. Just recently promoted and already taken out an important Rebel weapon provider.

“Sir, you need to see this,” the gunner called him over, pointing at a line of what looked to be speeder vehicles barrelling north, the number of which would have worried him, were he not in command of a full platoon with the firepower of two IDTs to back him up. The van proudly displayed the symbol of the Rebel terrorists on its roof.

“Follow them,” he ordered, delighting in how he could already feel the new rank insignia on his chest; Captain Nared sounded so much better than Lieutenant Nared to his ears. “As soon as they’re in range, open fire. And contact the base, we have Rebel elements.”

Obviously having noticed their pursuers, the fleeing vehicles began to scatter, running wild evasive manoeuvres to make targeting harder and harder. Still, if he had to settle for any one target to be taken out first, it would be that speedervan. These weak, sentimental rebellious fools would surely have the target of their operation in the most secure vehicle. Yet, it would not avail them as soon as the missiles started hitting.

The first of their weapons systems to come into range were the laser cannons, and quickly his and the second dropship began opening fire on the small convoy. As expected, the only thing that did was annoy the Rebel scum, maybe scare them a bit. At this range, little more could be expected. They were just about getting close enough when things started going wrong.

“Lieutenant,” the gunner announced loudly, drawing Nared’s fixated gaze from these people, already dead, only not yet informed of it. “We have lost comms contact with the other dropship. I’ve tried raising the base, but no luck there, either. Looks like someone’s jamming us.”

Well, that was indeed worrying, the young officer was honest enough to admit that to himself. Still, there was nothing on this planet that was not within Imperial hands that would be able to easily shoot them down. They probably just had a jammer installed on that speedervan, or maybe boosted the power of those that came with the bikes they were on and had probably stolen from the murdered scout squad.

And then, things started going really, _really_ wrong.

“Everyone brace, incoming fire,” the pilot called. Instinctively, Nared grabbed the railings to the side of the cockpit, but it was to no avail. Some kind of ordinance hit the dropship he was on, and at only 50 metres high and more than 400 km/h fast, the Imperial transport pummelled into the ground with enough kinetic energy to crumple the already damaged craft like a can of field rations, killing everyone inside.

Then, a barrage of turbolaser fire ensured no record-keeping device would be recovered, either.

OOOOOOOO

“Absolutely not,” the angry Bothan declared heatedly, trying to look larger than he actually was as he stood opposite the armoured figure of Captain Potter. “You will immediately transport us out of the system.”

That did it for Harry; he had enough experience dealing with arseholes, but this particular one seemed intent to drive him into a corner by being so incredibly rude in front of a good portion of his crew. That was without even mentioning that many of these people had just put their own lives on the line in an attempt to save his.

“I will do no such thing,” he declared forcefully. “One of my crew is still down on the planet, and as I said, our cover is important. What do you expect the Empire will think when, just after two gunships were wiped out of the sky, my ship tries running from the system? No, we will land again, we will pick up my crewmember, then we will do what our cover has people expecting from us: we will hunt some criminals, buy some weapons from a different distributer, and then, maybe, if you are nice, we might be so inclined as to _offer_ you a ride to wherever it is you’re going.”

At first, the Bothan Harry now knew to be named Beeth Va’lim, simply looked around the bridge, as if assessing the ship.

“This is a nice ship,” he finally observed, almost casually. “What tells you we won’t just take…”

He did not get further, felled as he had been by the strongest stunner Harry could manage with the new focus now wrapped around his left index finger. Immediately, the _Lightbringer’s_ troop contingent had the remaining members of the Rebel cell in their sights.

“Anyone else inclined to make any threats?” the wizard asked in quiet menace.

The rest of them, including the helpful human woman from earlier, simply raised their hands in surrender.

“Very wise,” Harry commented. “I want this one strip-searched, in an overall and taken to the brig, constant surveillance, isolation cell. The others can hand over their weapons and are confined to the crew deck. Full use of all the facilities, as befits our guests.”

Actually looking somewhat surprised, the other rebels handed over their multitude of weapons to one of the soldiers who had come up to them with a large crate.

“All of them,” the captain reminded the operatives. “Your boss did just threaten to steal my ship, leaving one of my crew stranded on the planet.”

Almost managing to look contrite, the woman drew a small knife from her boot and a small holdout blaster out from under her breastplate.

“I don’t even want to know how you had that one concealed,” Harry commented. “Once again, I am Harry Potter of the corvette _Lightbringer_. Just to say it upfront, I am not an official member of the Alliance, but merely here as a favour to someone important to me. My first duty is to the people on this and on my second ship. So, if you try something to hurt my crew, I will have you informed that everyone on this ship is armed and will be ordered to shoot you.”

With an audible gulp, the woman nodded in understanding. “Thank you for the warning,” she said. “I am Iabaes Kurn, by the way. Taking out a threat to your clan when it presents itself. I approve. We will follow your orders.”

“Good choice,” he replied simply. “I wish that could have gone better though. Is he always like that?”

General nodding among the Rebel cell.

“Too bad,” Harry responded, looking between the agents. “As soon as we’re done in this system, we can let you off anywhere you want, within reason. We’ll have to take Va’lim to Alliance High Command, though.”

“He was just…” one of the other team members spoke up but was quickly silenced by Iabaes.

“He was threatening to steal their ship,” she told the alien, whose species Harry did not know, in rather unquestionable terms. “We both know him well enough to know he might actually have tried. Betraying an ally like that is not only dishonourable, it would also almost certainly have gotten him killed.”

Hearing her speak like she did now, Harry finally took the time to take in the armour the older woman was wearing. Mercer, obviously having seen the glance, spoke up, “Ms. Kurn, you’re a Mandalorian?”


	19. Illicit Dealings

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: The Star Wars and Harry Potter copyrights lie with their respective owners, should any of them have any problem with my story being shared, I will comply with their wishes and remove it from circulation.  
> Please do not copy this work or any part of it.

“We’re just going to take out a local group of bandits or something like that, then we’ll set course for Yavin,” Harry told the widely smiling Mirror-Leia. “Might have to make a small detour first, though, to drop off the Alliance Special Operations team we picked up. Most of them at least…”

“Most of them?” the young woman inquired, crunching her expressive eyebrows together. “Define ‘most of them’.”

“All the ones who did not threaten to steal my ship,” he expounded on his earlier statement. “Meaning all but one will be fine; the other one we’ll be insisting to deliver right back to High Command.”

Now looking truly worried, the exact reason of which she did not give away immediately, Leia asked, “Do you mind if I go looking for General Vernan? He knows more about the SpecOps teams than most.”

“Only if, after we’re done talking to him, we can talk a bit more among ourselves,” the wizard stipulated with a cheeky grin. “Simply talking to you over the mirror is not the same as talking face to face, so we need more of it to make up for the lack in quality.”

“Sure, it’s the lack of _talking_ you’re worried about,” the Princess teased back, just before blushing prettily at her own audacity. “Of course, I’m most looking forward to learning even more hand-to-hand combat from Arden.”

“You know, I can actually almost believe you on that,” Harry admitted faux-solemnly. “You did tell me you ran away from an appointment to get all dressed up once to play in the garden; not to mention all the combat training you like talking about so much more than your etiquette training.”

The blush now creeping onto her neck as well, even as she was stepping into the turbolifts, Leia whispered, “Alright, there might just be something else I’m looking forward to… doing even more than train with Arden.”

Wisely, at least in his own mind, Harry chose not to comment on what her insinuation did to his own personal fantasies, for he could hear the opening of the lift doors and was quite sure Leia would appreciate the opportunity for her blush to go down a bit. Within short order (and already much less red in the face), the Princess had located Vernan and directed him to a private spot where discussing disciplinary matters was a bit more appropriate than it would have been in the mess hall.

“Captain Potter,” the general greeted neutrally. “What is the matter? The Princess said something about a problem of disciplinary nature. Is there a problem with your crew?”

“Oh no,” Harry rushed to assure the older man. “My crew is conducting themselves impeccably. Even shore leave was without incident. No, we ran into one of the SpecOps groups, and their leader made some threats, to which I had to react accordingly.”

Drawing a deep, calming breath the experienced officer asked, “Could I get any more details than that?”

“Sure. Name of the agent is Beeth Va’lim, he and his team held off the scout party that had found our target,” the young wizard explained. “When we got him onto our ship, he got rather… demanding. When I refused to immediately take him out of the system, both to keep our cover intact and because we still had someone on the ground, he said, and I quote ‘You have a nice ship. What tells you we won’t just take…’ He didn’t get to say more.”

Wide-eyed, Vernan questioned, “What did you do?”

“Stunned him, had him searched, put into some new clothes and thrown into the brig under constant surveillance,” Harry explained evenly. “I won’t abide by threats against my ship or my crew and will be expecting consequences. I’ll have the witness statements of all the members of my ground team corroborating that this is exactly what happened, not to mention the surveillance footage. Will that be enough? Because that would mean I could drop off Mr. Va’lim’s team at a port of their choice.”

“That should be enough, Captain Potter. We would be grateful if you could help the rest of the team however you can,” the general replied, and Harry could swear he heard the other man add a muttered, “Damn Bothans and their attitudes.”

Back in Leia’s room, he asked what Vernan had meant with Bothans and their attitudes.

“Oh, the Bothans can be a bit paranoid, and tend to be rather black and white in how they think of other people,” she explained, her general tone of voice and expression telling Harry that she had had the pleasure before. “Not from a moral standpoint, necessarily; their society just encourages individual success to a high degree, backstabbing and political manoeuvring are extremely common. You’re either with them or you’re against them.”

Listening to that description had only one direct impact on Harry: he felt pity. It sounded like such a deeply saddening way to live, always looking over your shoulder, fearing a figurative knife in your back. Never truly trusting the peace…

“Sounds like a rather unfulfilling life,” he finally observed solemnly; Leia simply nodded.

“Back to what we were talking about earlier,” Harry introduced a conversational U-turn. “If that’s something you want to do, I’d of course be ecstatic, but there’s no pressure, alright?”

A grin on her flushed face, the Princess responded, “Cute that you worry about me. I think I know what I want, though.”

OOOOOOOO

“Hello, you must be Palestro,” Harry greeted the blue-skinned man who had been the whole reason for their presence in the first place. “I am Captain Potter. Sorry I kept you waiting; I had to deal with an… issue of decorum.”

“No offence taken, Captain Potter,” the now former merchant said. “I am sure it is a fascinating story, and I look forward to hearing about your travels. If it does not cause you discomfort, please call me Famet.”

“Of course, Famet,” the captain allowed. “Then it is Harry for me. Have you been able to save what you wanted to save?”

With a dejected expression, the Wroonian turned around to point at the meagre ten pieces of merchandise Harry had allowed him to save of his stock, and it was visible how sad the destruction of his property made him.

“Sorry, Famet,” the young wizard said compassionately. “It was either your wares or our lives.”

“Oh, I understand,” the man assured one of his rescuers. “I just wish I had something to do…”

The grin now spreading on Harry’s face must have given away something, for within moments the other man looked less downtrodden and much more enthusiastic. That seemed to be a good sign, as far as the young wizard was concerned, so he presented his idea, “Well, I need a new weapon. A staff to be precise, made of phrik alloy. We already have the metal, just need someone to design the thing; if you’re interested, you could go wild, we can shape the material into any form you can think of.”

Almost too choked up to answer, Famet wheezed out a short, “Yes!” and got to work on a pad that someone on the crew must have given him. Satisfied that his guest was squared away, and quite happily at that, Harry turned his steps toward the conference room, where he did indeed find Arden.

“Anything interesting?” he asked as he strode into the room, looking at the witch flicking through bounties.

A slight grumbled told Harry that Arden was unhappy with what she had found, and she proceeded to flick to the next bounty on the list.

“Someone else must have been through here recently,” she complained, sounding supremely miffed. “High bounties are all gone, none for all the members of large groups, either. Best-paying one there is would be our blue friend, but I don’t think we’ll be handing him over anytime soon.”

Looking over the Dathomirian’s shoulder, Harry too took a look at the listings. “Sedition, Crimes against the New Order, Petty Thievery… who puts out a bounty because of petty thievery?”

Arden shrugged. “Don’t get me wrong, there are some really sick people in here,” she commented, a hint of disgust in her voice. “Just not the kind the Empire would take issue with other than perhaps due to the competition.”

Some flicks into the other direction brought up the picture of a reptilian humanoid with green skin, glowing orange eyes and a sword handle visible over its shoulder. Among the crimes listed were _unlicensed_ slavery, murder, piracy, hundreds of items each. Yet, the bounty sat at only 22000 credits.

“Mostly private bounties, though the biggest single one is still offered by the Wroonian planetary government,” she summed up what she must have read earlier. “Not really worth our time with the money it pays…”

“No, but it sounds like it might be worth our time just for the fact that it might help keep a lot of people safe,” Harry declared with certainty. “That’s a reward in and of itself, if you ask me.”

OOOOOOOO

The seedy cantina in one of the smaller cities surrounding Wroona’s capital was awash with noise. Beings from many different walks of life, though most of them illegal, had gathered in the establishment as they had a tendency to do in the waning hours of the day. While most of them were human, a good portion was made up of a host of different near- and non-humans, ranging from the more common ones like the Twi’lek to the rarely-seen, for which the bar’s newest guest did not even have a name.

Shrouded in a wide cloak and hidden behind the darkness of her cowl, Arden took in the gathered people, looking for someone who might be able to help in her mission. For a price, most likely; it was how these beings worked. Having been sent out to find the trail of their quarry, she had, with the help of the members of the Rebel team, located a place where they might be able to contact the black market that practically any planet with enough wealth and an Imperial presence had.

It had led her to this place.

To be fair, it had not led _her_ to this place, rather one of the members of the SpecOps team she was now shadowing, but the end result was pretty much the same in the witch’s mind. Having gotten over their shock at the sudden detainment of their team leader, the other members had nevertheless offered their help in finishing the mission that had been chosen as cover, partly out of ideological reasons, partly out of purely practical concerns. The sooner they had their target in custody, the sooner they would be able to drop off their guests.

That target was a Trandoshan by the name of Tresk. Slaver, bounty hunter, smuggler and whatever else fell his way and could make him money; it was quite obvious there was little that he would not do if it made him a few credits extra. For the last few years, it had been slave trade, mostly female Twi’leks as far as the had been able to find out. They had been sold to every corner of Imperial space, many going to high officers or bureaucrats who, despite outwardly following the general policy of human supremacy, had a more exotic taste than their own trophy wives could provide for.

Hearing it all had made Arden uncomfortably shift when thinking about how her own people treated their males.

Over at the bar, the Alliance agent she had been shadowing handed over what looked like a sizable amount of credits and left behind the cloaked figure she had been talking to. A wan smile on her face, the Miralukan Rebel returned to her watcher, took a sip of the highly mediocre drink the witch had standing in front of her and sat down on the opposite side of the table.

“I got us our in,” the woman, whom they all only knew as R’anteri, reported. “Cost quite a few credits, but you should be able to get that back when you claim the bounty.”

Arden watched her partner closely for a few moments, before asking the question she had been dreading, “You didn’t just buy information, did you?”

Her entire face screaming out the distaste she had for the entire situation, the Miralukan replied, “No, I made a down-payment on a ‘new’ Twi’lek slave girl. I’m assured she is of prime quality and quite rare a skin tone.”

Snorting audibly, the witch commented, “Captain’s going to be pissed.”

“That does not much concern me,” R’anteri admitted nonchalantly. “Don’t get me wrong, I’d rather he be happy with us, because we would have been in big trouble had those IDTs reached us, but I know that he’d eventually come to appreciate the wisdom of my actions. It is the fastest way to achieve our goal and keep more people from getting harmed.”

Watching the other woman talk always made Arden uncomfortable, even if she was not wearing her cloak. Not being able to look your opposite in the eye made her nervous beyond belief, and the Miralukans did not have eyes, and covered up their empty sockets.

“Let us get going,” the Rebel agent proposed eventually. “This place… it does not feel good. And that drink you were having is still burning in my throat.”

OOOOOOOO

“You did what?!” Harry roared as he was told about the women’s trip to the seedy cantina and what exactly R’anteri had been doing. “You bought a slave?”

“We made a down-payment on one,” the Miralukan clarified, although somehow that did not help Harry’s mood. “It is the fastest way to get on the track of whoever is behind the illegal slavery on the planet.”

The captain continued grumbling for a while after that, but eventually agreed that, if it got them to the slavers faster, it was probably a worthwhile thing to try. It also had the added bonus that it might just help keep this particular slave out of any cruel hands, if she were to be bought by them.

“How exactly is buying a slave supposed to get us to the slavers, anyway?” Harry asked after spending a good deal of time thinking about the plan. “What tells you that there won’t just be some underlings sent to handle the transaction while their boss stays in the shadows?”

“Believe me,” R’anteri assured him. “This is one transaction the leader of the whole operation will want to be a part of.”

“And if not, you’ll have placed a tracker on the credits,” the witch added.

Giving the two women an accepting shrug, Harry looked at Arden. “I’m calling Leia now. You can come and help me explain why we’re buying a female Twi’lek slave.”

OOOOOOOO

Once again, it was on Arden and R’anteri to play the parts of the buyer in their operation. The contact they had made the down-payment to had given them a time and a place where they would meet with the seller to hand over ‘the goods’ and the credits.

As was most definitely called for, the two women had backup in the form of a disillusioned Harry, a group of Alliance soldiers in a van and a larty floating in the cover of a low-hanging cloud; that was without even mentioning the group of disillusioned probe droids that would be following the participants of the meeting to wherever they went afterward.

Of course, there was also the small detail of Corsek, hunkered down on a nearby building with good visibility, very much looking forward to the first deployment of his newly acquired DC-15A blaster rifle, found on the abandoned Republic station. It was Corsek’s voice that Harry was now hearing in his ear.

 _“They’ve got backup too,”_ he warned on the frequency. _“I see two sharpshooters, a few goons, an armoured van, just like ours… There’s no way they haven’t seen me here on the roof.”_

“Understood,” the wizard replied, safe in the knowledge that his charms would keep him unheard as well as unseen. “So, no ambushing them during the meeting. We can only assume that they would have some way to kill the slave if it came down to it. I could protect her against blasters, but I can’t stop them from blowing up a slave implant.”

 _“Roger, Boss,”_ the confirmations began coming in from all team members.

Their deliberations made, the group simply waited the remaining few minutes until finally, their target arrived; admittedly, he had looked less scary on the holo pictures, where the hulking two metres of lizard had been shrunken down to manageable proportions.

“My guys don’t appreciate the sharpshooter on the roof,” the Trandoshan said gruffly in lieu of any kind of greeting. “Or the armoured speeder…”

Arden snorted. “And we don’t appreciate the goons, the sharpshooters and the armoured speedervan either, so I think we can call it quits. Where’s the merchandise?”

An expression of pure disinterest on his face, the slaver waved to his goons who then proceeded to drag a surprisingly docile, red-skinned Twi’lek out of the speedervan and into the waning light of dusk. She was slim, almost petite of stature, her long lekku reaching down almost to the small of her back, and clothed in a way that left very little to the imagination.

“Now the credits,” Tresk ordered dispassionately, coldly whispering his demands. “45000, not one less.”

With a deliberateness and calm that was both surprising and deeply admirable, as far as Harry was concerned, the Miralukan Alliance agent went back to the van, got the agreed-upon amount of credits (in hard currency, as befitting the kind of business they were in) and walked back to the exchange slowly.

“45000, plus the 5000 we made as down-payment,” R’anteri declared, confidently looking into the slaver’s burning orange eyes. “We’ll exchange at the same time.”

As one, the two of them began moving toward each other, the Twi’lek slave walking along her slaver docilely, face downward, shuffling across the dirty street on her bare feet.

“The control for her implant?” the Miralukan demanded, immediately snatching the small device out of the Trandoshan’s large hand as soon as it came into reach. Then, she leaned in a little, and whispered, “Whatever you’re planning, I would advise against it; credits are worth nothing to a corpse. Or maybe it’s being a prisoner you’re more scared of, losing all favour with the Scorekeeper? We can arrange that.”

Noting the glint of anger and stubbornness in the slaver’s eyes, she continued. “You didn’t really think we came with only one van and one sharpshooter to trade something this valuable with someone like you, right?”

An expression of pure loathing on his face, though for what exactly, Harry could not tell, the Trandoshan took the credits and marched back to his thugs, got into the van and left.

“What was that all about?” he asked, still disillusioned, although that really did not make much of a difference to the Miralukan.

“There’s a saying about these Trandoshans,” the Rebel agent explained. “When they’re loud, be wary; when they’re silent, be terrified. This one was silent, so I assumed he was planning something.”

“And what was that part with the Scorekeeper about?” Arden inquired, having heard the entire conversation a bit more clearly. “Sounded like something religious…”

“Oh, it is,” R’anteri confirmed. “The Trandoshans believe in a deity called ‘the Scorekeeper’ who awards points for aggressiveness, successful hunts or exotic kills. However, they lose all of that favour should they ever be captured or shamed during a hunt. He will not be easy to catch because he will much rather die, than be dishonoured.”

Listening to the two women talk with one ear, it was rather interesting after all, Harry dispelled the disillusionment charm on himself, before engaging with the comm unit in his helmet.

“Mercer,” he spoke into the connection that had been open from the beginning of the meeting. “You heard all that?”

 _“Sure, Boss,”_ came the expected reply, professional as always in such a situation. _“I have two of the droids following the van, two are waiting to see where those sharpshooters are going to vanish to.”_

“Excellent,” Harry replied, adding, just before the connection was cut, “Keep us posted.”

OOOOOOOO

“Wow, that guy is even more paranoid than I ever was,” Harry muttered as he watched the signal from the probe droids steadily move cross the planetary map. “How often have they changed vehicles by now?”

“Three times, Boss,” Mercer replied, his eyes glued to the holo-table just as much as Harry’s. “Where’s the money?”

“Still moving,” the captain explained. “Not really sure, where, though. It’s a bit too far away to tell to exactly; the tracking charms just gives me a direction and a rough estimate of the distance.”

The _Lightbringer’s_ second-in-command grunted in understanding, just as the two men were joined by Arden. “Still moving?”

Both of them nodded.

“Paranoid, much?”

Again, nodding.

“Seems like they’ve stopped,” Harry finally observed, pointing toward the no-longer moving dots on the by now very large map. “Helmsman, bring us deeper into the atmosphere. I have a weird feeling about this.”

As ordered, the former Imperial manning the ship’s controls that day began steering the corvette toward Wroona’s surface, all the while the young wizard was feeling the pull of his tracking charm intensify and the direction become ever more clear.

“They’ve split up,” he eventually declared, when it started becoming overly clear that the charm’s results differed wildly from the direction the signal from the probe droids indicated. “Must have had a second ride waiting at one of those stops to throw off any pursuers.”

“Clever little womp-rats,” Mercer grumbled at that particular announcement, but was mostly ignored.

“Helmsman,” Harry ordered the young officer, “Keep us at this height and set course for… 11 o’ clock.”

With barely an audible sound, the _Lightbringer_ turned her nose toward the direction her captain had assigned. Meanwhile, that very captain was feeling into himself to follow the cord linking him to the credits they had used to pay the slaver. Just as expected, the longer they followed the pull of Harry’s magic, the less directional the pull of the tracking charm became; instead, it was now just a general feeling of ‘down’.

“Hold here,” the captain instructed and his ship ground to a halt. “What can you find?”

The last bit had been directed at the sensor operator, who was now furiously tapping away at the controls in front of her, somehow managing to keep up with the stream of data flowing past before her eyes.

“Not much,” the woman offered. “Just some burned-out refugee village. Probably an Imperial retaliation for whatever imagined slight a few scared and desperate people supposedly committed.”

“Perfect hiding place,” Mercer concluded sombrely. “No one will want to look twice, maybe it’s even under some form of unofficial Imperial protection; you know, it remains a military exclusion zone, but no one interferes with business, as long as the wheels keep getting greased and the pockets keep getting lined.”

Harry snorted at that, no longer surprised with the staggering amount of corruption spread throughout the Empire’s military and administration, especially away from the core.

“Can we get in there without getting into trouble with the Imps?” he asked his first officer, eyebrow raised at the idea of breaking Imperial movement restrictions.

“Should work just fine,” Mercer assured the group. “There can only be some low-level, informal cooperation. Otherwise there wouldn’t be a bounty out for unlicensed slave trade. Probably just some disgruntled officer looking to supplement his paycheck.”

“Alright then,” the young wizard announced. “One team with me and Arden, we take out whatever we find in this camp, one team with Javoc and Corsek to look into the last stop the droids tracked those speeders to.”

OOOOOOOO

“Everybody ready?” Harry asked into the comms unit built into his helmet. Receiving affirmatives not only from his own team, but also the second one that had been assigned to smoke out whatever part of the slaving ring they could find in their vehicles’ last stop, he ordered for the raid to proceed.

“Go in, no unnecessary risks,” the command ran through their communication channel, just as the captain nodded into the direction of his cloaked companion; Arden had been disillusioned, just as a precaution to any… unlucky surprises.

His presence revealing spell showed only a marginal presence of guards at this station, just about enough to keep control of the slaves, not that it would be all that hard if they all had slave implants or explosive collars. Things being like they were, they were set to quickly waltz through the defenders, leaving only Tresk as a real danger to deal with. As had become his custom, Harry held up three outstretched fingers and counted down. When all of his fingers were pulled into a fist, the charges one of the Rebel special forces soldiers had planted went off, and immediately the group of heavily armed soldiers stormed inside. The picture that formed in front of them was not a pretty one.

All over the room they had stormed there were cages, though most of them were empty; excrement was lying around inside the metal constructs, their purpose clear to anyone that laid even a single eye on them. Then there were the guards, though they had obviously been caught on the wrong foot, and the grouping of stun shots that hit each of the three criminals into the chest would do little to improve that. However, right in the middle of it all stood Tresk, calm as can be, in his hand a trigger, the kind of which Harry was all too familiar with; after all it was not unlike what he himself had used to disable the Death Star’s tractor beam projectors.

“No step further, human,” the Trandoshan slaver said in his eery, low and grumbling voice. His basic was understandable, but heavily accented. “Otherwise, I will turn your companions and all the slaves in our outpost into mush.”

The being’s orange eyes glimmered sadistically at that. “Oh yes, I knew something was wrong about that offer for the Twi’lek. You were too well organised and equipped for what you claimed you were.”

Harry simply watched the whole scene play out in consternation, even as he listened to the heavy chatter going on in their communications channel. He could hear Mercer ordering the other troops out of the slavers’ outpost, yet he could also hear someone disregarding those orders.

“I assume this is some kind of… aggressive negotiation strategy?” the bounty hunter ventured, even though he was quite aware that negotiation was hardly an applicable word.

“This is a hostage situation,” the slaver corrected. “Unless you want your people to be turned into a fine mist, you will do exactly as I say. You’re Vincent Dash of the _Lightbringer_ , yes, I know who you are, so I know you’ve made quite a bit of money recently…”

Tresk did not get to say more, for in that moment a heavy thump could be heard as the faint shimmer of Arden appeared behind him. The slaver went slack, and in that moment, first an explosion and then static filled the communications channel.


	20. In Memoriam

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: The Star Wars and Harry Potter copyrights lie with their respective owners, should any of them have any problem with my story being shared, I will comply with their wishes and remove it from circulation.  
> Please do not copy this work or any part of it.

Natleen Smitts, former Imperial Navy boarding specialist and now a proud member of the _Lightbringer’s_ crew was waiting in front of one of the slavers’ hideouts, durasteel doors barring entry. Not that they would hold the team back for long, as the young woman placed a shaped thermal charge against the sheets of metal.

“Breach,” the order from their team leader Corsek Betsby, another former Imperial sounded through their communication channel and she immediately blew the door. Within moments, the group of soldiers was through the now empty frame and engaging the disoriented criminals on the other side.

Another few moments later, the guards had been dispatched with stun blasts to their chests, crumbling to the ground.

 _“This was a trap!”_ their hitherto smooth operation was suddenly interrupted by the voice of Mercer Fenwick, first officer on their corvette and second-in-command to their captain. _“You’re sitting on a live bomb, get out of there!”_

The tone of order in the man’s voice was undeniable, yet there was something that gave Natleen pause; in cages all around the room she had stumbled into were dozens of sentient beings, all of them collared, looking at the interlopers defeatedly.

 _“You heard the man, everyone out,”_ Betsby ordered his team over the comms channel, and most everyone gave their affirmatives. _“That includes you, Smitts! Everyone else is already out!”_

Heedless of the order she had been given, Natleen sprinted toward the closest cage and got busy on the lock. This might be her opportunity to right some of the wrongs she had done during her Imperial service.

 _“Damn it, Smitts, what are you doing?”_ her team leader’s angry voice broke through these thoughts, just as she had managed to open the first cage door. _“Alright, I’m coming…”_

Natleen Smitts never heard him say anymore, as she and everyone else inside the cave were engulfed in a searing fireball.

OOOOOOOO

The mood among the crew of the _Lightbringer_ and, to a lesser extent the _Morningstar_ , was rather sombre. Most of them had at some point lost comrades before, obviously, that was impossible to avoid in military service, yet they had now suffered the first casualty among this particular crew.

And it seemed so utterly useless, somehow.

One of those hit the worst was obviously the captain and leader of their operation. Harry Potter was sitting in his room wallowing, in all honesty, in self-pity, when his first officer once again decided to barge into his room and disturb his boss’ ruminations.

“Hey, Boss,” the unusually subdued man said. “We found out what happened. That remote trigger had a dead man’s switch; when Arden knocked out Tresk his grip went slack, and the detonator was triggered.”

Harry just grumbled inarticulately, still staring into the distance.

“Boss, this was bound to happen at some point,” Mercer observed matter-of-factly as he sat down in one of the chairs the captain’s quarters were adorned with. “Every one of these people knew what they were signing up for, we even gave Corsek’s team enough of a warning to get out there safely while you were stalling Tresk. There’s nothing more that you could have done.”

“We could have taken out the headquarters first, not split our forces up,” the wizard observed catatonically, still staring into the distance.

“And it might have ended up the other way around,” the former Imperial, of whom Harry suddenly remembered that he had lost an entire ground team to an ambush once. “We didn’t know what their main base was. Imagine we had stormed only that trapped place; we would have all been blown up.”

“You don’t know that.”

“Yes, I do,” Mercer replied firmly. “Tresk must have had some kind of surveillance up in that place, and he would have pulled the trigger the moment we all were inside.”

That shut the younger man up for a while as he worked to pull himself together to really think about what might have been done different, what specific decision had been somehow wrong. The only one he could think of was that of Smitts declining the order of leaving the trap.

“I see you came to the same conclusion I did,” the former Imperial commented. “Don’t get me wrong, I still place the blame at the feet of the one who planted the bomb and held the trigger, but she knew what the situation was and decided not to follow the evacuation order.”

Though he was aware of how grim he must still be looking, Harry sharply nodded his head to indicate he understood where his friend was coming from, yet it seemed the older man was not yet done.

“That being said, at some point, you will make an error in judgement, and it will cost someone. You have to be prepared for that, as well,” he warned sagely, before grabbing Harry’s shoulder in a strong grip and dragging him toward the door. “Now we need to talk to Arden; she’s in a bit of a funk, too.”

OOOOOOOO

As it turned out, describing Arden as being ‘in a bit of a funk’ was like describing Hagrid with the words ‘a bit larger than usual’; technically true, but also definitely understating it, and massively at that. The two of them found the witch in the training room where she was taking out her frustration on an Alliance soldier who had been unwise enough to volunteer for some ‘training’.

“Arden, let the man live,” Harry interceded, as she was finishing up a blistering barrage of staff hits on who now turned out to be Tevo. “He’s done nothing wrong, and he’s lost a comrade, too.”

Severely disgruntled, the Dathomirian looked around the room, inclined her head to her opponent in a gesture of respect, and put away the training staff.

“Yes, well he didn’t cause the explosion,” she replied stubbornly, letting herself fall onto the matts, back to the wall of the training room. “Should have just waited a bit longer for everyone to clear out…”

Determined to do for his friend what Mercer had done for him, Harry sat down next to Arden and slung an arm around her surprisingly unresisting shoulder; that alone let him know how badly things had affected her.

“What would you like to have done differently?” he asked, giving her heaving shoulder a squeeze. “Considering what you knew then, what would have been a better decision?”

For a while, the witch remained silent, looking at the far wall, though still visibly seething in anger.

“Grabbed the detonator so it wouldn’t have blown,” she grumbled belligerently, then, after looking at Harry’s expression, she added, “Fine, with what I knew then, there was nothing for me to do differently. That’s not the point; I should have known better.”

“Maybe, maybe not,” the wizard observed. “Important is that you learn from this; in the future, crazy people with detonators in their hands aren’t simply knocked out, their detonator is to be secured and then you can smack them about.”

That seemed to lift Arden’s spirits, and she turned to look around the entire room again, before her gaze focused on the dropped combat staff.

“Speaking of smacking things about…” the Dathomirian suggested, only to receive a rueful shake of the head in response.

“Sorry, another time,” Harry replied apologetically, though he was secretly rather happy that he had a reason not to fight a frustrated Arden with, he knew as much from experience, possibly very painful sticks. “I have to take a look into that slave we bought from Tresk, then we’ll hand him in for the bounty.”

The gleam entering her eyes as he told her his reason for declining let the young wizard know that his friend was more than interested in participating in at least the latter of the two activities; he himself was rather looking forward to that part, too, though he was still quite apprehensive about the former. Despite his mixed feelings on the matter, Harry quickly got up and offered Arden a hand, then turned toward the exit.

Mercer had put the now former slave up in one of the crew quarters, and that is where they found her; despite the stack of clothing that had been laid out for her, she was still wearing the scraps of cloth provided by the slavers. They were barely enough to hide the most important parts. The young wizard could not really guess her age, though she seemed to be around seventeen or eighteen. That was assuming Twi’lek aged the same way humans did in adolescence.

Her state of dress, or lack thereof, however, allowed him to really take in the young woman he had just bought; the lekku so typical of her species were present in her as well, long, almost to the small of her back, yet partly hidden behind some sort of headdress, the coverage it offered deeply contrasting the lack of coverage the rest of her ‘clothes’ decidedly did not provide. The woman’s barely covered breasts were of a medium size, as far as Harry could tell (not that he had much to compare them to). Overall, her demeanour screamed out how lost she was feeling.

That changed the moment the captain entered the room; immediately, she was on the ground, kneeling deferentially, eyes lowered.

“Are you my master?” she questioned pleadingly. “Please, let your obedient slave serve you.”

To say Harry was taken aback would have been a rather sizable understatement. In fact, he was gobsmacked. Sure, he had expected there to be some indoctrination after what information R’anteri had been able to relay to them, but this was definitely beyond his expectations. Without missing another beat, the wizard bent down, gently took her arm in hand and began guiding her to sit next to him on the bed.

“I’m Harry,” he introduced himself to the clearly distraught Twi’lek, trying to be as non-threatening as possible. “What’s your name?”

For a few moments, she looked at him as if he had grown a second head. “I do not have a name. I am Slave 1407. My Master chooses my name to be whatever he desires.”

Whatever Harry had been expecting, this was not it; without any idea how to proceed further, he simply looked at the red-skinned woman for a while, 1407 it seemed, not saying a word.

“Have I displeased you, Master? Please, tell your slave how to please you.”

It was the utter despair in her voice more than anything else that finally brough the young wizard back to the present as he absentmindedly replied, “No, no, I am not… displeased.”

Shaking his head in the hopes of somehow clearing his mind, Harry addressed her once again, “You must have had a name once that we can call you by? What name did your parents give you?”

She looked at him, again in that way that told him she was both flummoxed and scared of disappointing her ‘Master’.

“I don’t know my parents,” the Twi’lek explained evenly, not a hint of emotion as far as Harry could detect. “The instructors always said they didn’t want me, so they sold me, and I would be lucky if anyone ever bought me, so I should work hard to be worthy of the one buying me.”

Much as he did not like admitting it, the story being told to him tugged at a few scabs Harry had thought long since healed; obviously, his treatment at the hands of the Dursleys had often been harsh, brutal and cruel at times, but nothing approaching the depth of what this woman must have gone through. And yet, what to him seemed to be the most egregious of all crimes was telling a child their parents did not want them. He himself had been in the position of thinking his parents maybe did not really want him, otherwise they would not have left him. It was a childish way of thinking, obviously; still, if you were a child when you were being told that the two people you should have been able to rely on the most of all had foolishly gotten killed, driving while drunk, or even sold you? That could wreak havoc on an impressionable young mind.

Worst of all, Harry did not have it in himself to spin her some tale of her parents probably still flying around the galaxy, desperately searching for their daughter. While, from all accounts he had familiarised himself with, it was not all that common for Twi’lek parents to sell their children into slavery, it certainly was not unheard of. And if what he had heard of the general rarity and value of the red-skinned Lethan subspecies was anything to go by, there certainly were clear financial advantages to it; not to mention the strange views some of her society seemed to hold on the supposed benefits the whole arrangement had for the sentient beings being sold like property.

“Boss… Harry,” Arden bumped his shoulder to refocus his attention on the present. “Glad to see you’re back with us.”

Next to him, sitting on the edge of the bed she had been assigned, the young female Twi’lek was still looking at him in a surprising mixture of deference and expectation; not demanding, really, more like she was waiting for him to demand something of her.

“Alright, for the moment, we’ll have to be able to call you something other than 1407, or ‘slave’,” the wizard finally decided. “You can just pick something you like. Oh, and please just call me Harry, alright.”

Once again rather perturbed by what she was being asked to do, especially by the last part (Harry had added it to specifically circumvent any ‘the great Harry Potter, sirs’ in his future), the former slave looked up at him.

“I do not understand Ma… Harry,” the young woman finally admitted, seemingly quite scared of some kind of repercussion. “My Master chooses my name, so it pleases him.”

Sensing that he would not get anywhere with this, the young wizard wracked his brain for something that allowed him to both give her a name, while also not giving her a permanent name and taking even more of her choices away. Eventually, he remembered something from his original planet, about using a placeholder name; he even remembered one of the more common ones, as far as he knew.

“Then you’ll be Jane, for the moment,” Harry announced gently. “You can pick one for yourself whenever you like.”

OOOOOOOO

The crew of the _Lightbringer_ was assembled in the corvette’s hangar bay, the few people manning the _Morningstar_ having joined them for the ceremony.

It was the burial of what they had been able to recover of Natleen Smitts, namely, her weapon and her helmet. Everything else had blended with the destroyed remains of the slaves Tresk, in his quest to evade capture, had blown up. So, these two things, so inadequate to really describe or encompass the entire human life they stood for were now ensconced in a small sarcophagus, hoisted onto a plinth in the front of the gathering. Naturally, the captain had to say a few words, as much as he did not want to do so.

“Natleen was someone I did not know as well as I would have liked,” Harry began his prepared remarks, jotted together with the assistance of Leia the evening before, right after they had handed in the slaver. “But I would like to make a few observations I made.”

Taking a small pause, the young wizard looked onto the faces before him, everyone adorned in their uniforms, solemnly keeping the silence. “Even when training directly with Arden, she never let herself get beaten down, at least in a figurative way of speaking. In our crew of recent Imperial defectors, long-time and life-long members of the Alliance she made an effort to connect with people and connect them with each other.”

General assent seemed to be the feeling permeating through the crowd at that; indeed, the lively former Navy woman had often played the part of a mediator in any conflicts between crewmembers, especially if their diverse service records came up.

“In the end, even with the order of clearing out still ringing in her ears, she tried, against all odds, to save people she felt she could and should help,” the captain continued, just before throwing a certain, rather severe look into the gathered members of his crew that set the stage for his next announcement. “However, this does not mean I condone her actions. It is said not to speak ill of the dead, so what I am about to say is nothing the likes of that; instead, let us learn from Natleen, learn when to follow our shared instincts of courage and when to use our heads instead. As someone always devoted to the betterment of this crew, I am certain she would have approved of us learning this lesson from her demise. It is a lesson I myself have had to learn, and have, most probably, still not completely internalised.”

“So, let us learn Natleen’s last lesson well, and then continue to remember her as the brave woman she was.”

As Harry stepped away from the podium he had temporarily transfigured from a cargo crate they had… ‘requisitioned’ from the slavers’ hideout, he was silently satisfied with how well his speech had gone; people seemed both suitably mournful as well as appropriately reminded of the fragility of life in the face of a futile decision. After him, a few others spoke, comrades and friends both old and new, and it was once again obvious how well-liked Smitts had been. When eventually the last person had stepped down, the ground team began gathering around the coffin on its plinth, joined by Corsek, her last direct commander; under his leadership, they hoisted the quadanium-hulled remnants of Natleen Smitts onto their shoulders and marched slowly to the air-sealing shield in place at the edge of space. Without much pomp and circumstance, their first casualty was then given over to the void.

Not one to dwell overly long on a loss, at least he had told himself that, Harry quickly gathered the key people in the briefing room.

“So, where to now?” the captain asked Iabaes, the older Mandalorian woman who, due to the continued indisposition of their original leader, had taken command of the Special Operations team. “We’re returning to the Base, so we’re core-bound for a while. Anywhere you’d like to be dropped off?”

Looking around the room a bit, almost as if looking for people trying to listen in, Iabaes leaned in a bit before she replied. “Would you be able to have us onboard until the Mandalore system? It’s not that much of a detour, and I think there might be something in it for you, as well.”

Now seriously intrigued, Harry motioned for her to proceed with what she had to offer.

“I am in contact with a resistance group on Concordia, Mandalore’s first moon,” she explained, all the while inserting a data chip into the corresponding port on the holo table, which flickered to light, showing an image of a dry barren world circled by a dry, barren satellite; Harry was beginning to sense a pattern there. “With the help of traitors amongst my own people, the Empire has managed to subvert and enslave much of my home planet’s society. With the destruction of the Death Star, and more and more systems in open rebellion, now might be a good time to join them…”

After that, she began weaving an elaborate plan to attack the main Imperial stronghold on the planet, located in an abandoned amusement park of all things; yet, despite the solid planning behind it, the whole thing gave Harry one important impression.

“Sorry, but it seems you’re overreaching in a situation that is dire, but not that dire,” he analysed what he had heard, surprising himself with how logically he was approaching the whole thing; obviously he had indeed learned a bit and somewhat moved past his more Gryffindor-ish instincts. “We might be able to do it, but I don’t like the odds… any softer targets that would allow the Protectors to gather more forces?”

“I was afraid you would see it that way,” Iabaes admitted. “I had hoped you might have an idea on how to do this… there is one other target that might be worth our effort. With the Imperial takeover, a group of ‘advisors’ has been placed on the board of MandalMotors, which is now working for the Empire, helping to bleed out planet dry.”

The stormy expression of the stern woman’s face told enough of a story to convey how much she despised the situation of her people. “They are still operating some of the mines on Concordia, strip-mining vast swathes of land, and then boring shafts into the ground to get even to the deep deposits; our source works at one of those mines, and they were able to relay to us data that suggests that the parts of the mine that have run dry have been turned into a secret prototype lab.”

The holo table now held a three-dimensional representation of what looked like a vast underground network of tunnels at the centre of which sat a large chamber.

“They are working on a new prototype starfighter, and I happened to notice you have a nice, empty hangar bay available…” she insinuated with a gleam in her eyes.

“What’s in it for you? The Protectors?” Harry questioned, unwilling to take a gift horse at face-value when it could easily be stuffed with thermal detonators; the smile on the Mandalorian’s face was enough to tell him his inquiry was not completely without cause.

“Two things,” Iabaes replied with dark amusement. “Make that three; a ship, our revenge, and enough beskar to outfit a whole lot of soldiers in Mandalorian armour.”

OOOOOOOO

“I am sure you will be able to write glorious stories with this weapon, Captain Potter,” Famet Palestro announced as he handed over the plans and components he had been working on for Harry’s new staff. “As soon as you miraculously form the phrik, that is. I must admit I am looking forward to seeing how you do it.”

“Let us not keep you waiting any longer then,” the wizard announced as he took the small data chip with the plans and inserted it into the reader on his pad. Quickly, the schematics were displayed, to scale, nonetheless, above the holographic projector/camera mounted on the accompanying wristband. This technological boost, as well as the practice he had gotten with his other two foci, ensured that embedding the last crystal shard in the flowing alloy to be used for his staff was no real challenge for Harry.

Palestro, on the other hand, simply stood there, wide-eyed as he stared at the shifting material.

“I have never, not even in the wildest stories of my people, heard of such a skill,” the Wroonian breathed. “The things I could do with that at my disposal…”

“Well, don’t let me stop you,” Harry snorted as he finally let the blank of his newest weapon sink to the table. “You’re welcome to stay on the _Lightbringer_ , given that your cover seems to be blown. We could use someone who’s good with weapons I think.”

The immediate reaction to that was stunned silence, quickly followed by immense joy. “Oh, I must get to designing immediately,” Palestro announced eagerly and was already at the door, when he turned back around and grabbed the unfinished blank and the various other parts, he had had Harry shape. “After I finish this.”

And indeed, barely an hour later the blue-skinned man had returned, proudly carrying in his arms (almost like a new-born) his and the wizard’s creations. Just like the blank before it, the staff was black, yet it held a shine of silver around the edges that was hard for Harry to characterise. Lengthwise, it was around twenty centimetres taller than he, when considering the tips.

“Everything went as you expected?” he asked the Wroonian, who nodded eagerly.

“Everything,” Famet assured proudly. “The tips can be set under current, like an electrostaff, or retracted so you would be able to use the vibroblades.”

As he was talking, the blue-skinned man triggered the relevant control on the middle part, and with barely a noise, the upper- and lowermost fifteen centimetres, both hollowed out, retracted. In their place were now two wicked-looking blades, made of the same metal as the rest of the weapon, yet polished to a very different sheen. The effect was certainly intimidating.

Fascinated, Harry reached out and received the staff from Palestro’s hands. As his hands touched the cool material, the feeling reminded him once again of getting his first wand, and he knew with certainty that casting with this weapon would be a joy indeed; perhaps not as precise as with his actual wand, or as subtle as with the ring, but a joy nonetheless. Upon his triggering of the relevant controls, the tips returned to their ‘active’ position and were soon crackling with energy, enough of it to knock out a humanoid being on the lower settings. What the higher settings might do, Harry did not want to know for the moment. Whirling it around, the young wizard found that it indeed did not weigh that much more than the wooden staffs Arden had been training him on.

“It’s so light…” he marvelled, to the amusement of the former weapons trader.

“Yes, phrik alloy is a very special material, indeed,” he commented. “We were lucky, I have to say. The components I needed to make this were almost exactly the ones I chose to take with me on our hasty retreat from my home world.”

“You used the last of your stock to make this for me?” Harry looked at the man, aghast. “Why would you do that? There was no hurry!”

Palestro looked at the captain disapprovingly. “I could not have thought of a better use for the last of my stock, than to use it for the one whose intervention allowed me to live and collect more stock,” he responded staunchly. “And if we’re actually going to fight on Mandalore, possibly with or against Mandalorians, I have a feeling I might be able to acquire some new stock fairly soon, and of prime quality and rarity, too.”


	21. No One Expects...

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: The Star Wars and Harry Potter copyrights lie with their respective owners, should any of them have any problem with my story being shared, I will comply with their wishes and remove it from circulation.  
> Please do not copy this work or any part of it.

“How much longer until you get here?” Leia asked during their now routine mirror-call the evening before the _Lightbringer_ was set to arrive in the Mandalore system. “I miss you; and this Jedi training is not really for me…”

“A few days, a week, two weeks,” Harry offered with a shrug. “What is it with the training? Still the same as before?”

“Yes,” she replied, sounding rather unsure of that answer. “No… maybe. I just find it hard to concentrate on training when I am constantly wondering what Obi-Wan is keeping from us. And a lot of the code and tenets of the old Jedi Order seem rather unhealthy to me. He accepts that there must be change, I think, but he also grew up in it. That kind of indoctrination is hard to shed.”

“Mercer and I talked about that a while ago,” the young wizard offered his thoughts. “It sounded rather constrictive and emotionally stunting to both of us, and I know all about being emotionally stunted.”

The princess looked at him with sympathy. “For what it’s worth, I think you have turned out much better than anyone had any right to expect. Being in control suits you.”

“Thank you,” he replied earnestly, before moving in equal earnestness to quickly change the topic back again. “Anyway, a religious order with power over other people’s lives… that’s just a recipe for disaster. Even if they manage to help prop up another republic, at some point the populace will take issue with beings like the Jedi holding sway over the government. People in my home reality sure did at some point.”

Leia nodded in understanding. “That would be a problem, yes,” she agreed, deeply in thought. “But the Jedi are important resources, don’t underestimate the impact a single one can have on a battle, an entire war even. Let alone their ability to stop them beforehand; father always talked about the incredible feats their negotiators could achieve.”

“Not saying they should be barred from public office or being part of the military or law enforcement,” Harry offered. “Just not under their own jurisdiction as basically a state-sanctioned religious order.”

As out of character as their conversation might have seemed for the Harry Potter of a few years prior, he had found that this kind of topic seemed far more interesting when seen in the light of Leia’s fascination with it. Additionally, he liked to think he had done some maturing during these years.

“That might actually work,” Mirror-Leia eventually commented, but only after visibly mulling the idea over in her head. “One citizen’s personal religious beliefs are none of the government’s concerns, as long as they don’t infringe on anyone else’s rights…”

“No reason to sound so surprised,” the wizard complained half-heartedly. “It is a common concept where I come from. I was bored and for once decided to pick up a book.”

“Sorry,” she apologised honestly. “Political theory does not seem like something you would be interested in. Still, I definitely agree.”

They continued talking for a while, meandering from topic to topic as they enjoyed simply spending time together, even if it was only a visual connection. Soon, that would be able to change.

“Anything interesting happen while I was gone?” Harry eventually asked, their former topic of Jane, the former Twi’lek slave having run its course.

“Don’t know if it’s interesting,” Leia pondered for a bit, before smiling and telling him anyway. “The scavengers and guards we had stationed all around the Death Star debris had a run-in with the forces of some new crime lord. Didn’t end well for us, unfortunately. We managed to recover some of the data pods they were trying to steal, and even that was only because we had the backing of the forces Chandrila had gathered for defending against the Empire.”

“What could be so interesting about data pods?” the wizard inquired, puzzled as to why anyone would risk bloodshed over something so trivial. “Was the data that important?”

“Well, we don’t really know,” came the somewhat dejected reply. “We lost a whole bunch of ships trying to hold the Consortium back and only gathered two pods with data on some Imperial fleet positions, schematics we already know, a few strategic assets we might now be able to strike at…”

The bounty hunter pondered what she had told him for a while; interestingly, even as intensely as he had learned about the criminal syndicates of this galaxy, something like the ‘Consortium’ did not sound familiar at all.

“Who’s this ‘Consortium?” he asked, both out of curiosity and a healthy, professional interest.

“Don’t worry, I had to ask someone as well,” Leia chuckled, obviously having guessed his thoughts by his reaction; it was nice to be so easily readable for her, Harry decided. Showed she knew him rather well. “The Zann Consortium. They’re a small but rapidly growing group, currently engaged in a turf war with Jabba the Hutt, led by an Imperial washout named Tyber Zann. The kind of people who would do anything for a few credits.”

Hearing her talk like that, the young bounty hunter was quite happy that he had a set of morals complementing his work in that particular profession. It was a good thing he seemed to like a fierce woman.

OOOOOOOO

“So, what can you tell me about this fighter, then?” Harry asked Iabaes as they sat in the mess hall, Mandalore just a few hours of flight away. “Anything special about it?”

“You mean apart from the excellent Mandalorian ship designing that went into it?” the older woman joked, before becoming serious once more. “Yes, there are quite a few rather special things about it, actually. A hyperdrive, for one, which is always a good place to start; shields and a sturdy hull, three heavy laser and two ion cannons, and two ordinance launchers. All that in a ship quick and nimble as a TIE.”

Regaining her joking manner from earlier, which had started shining through more and more, the longer she and her team had stayed on the _Lightbringer_ , she added, “It’s a really good snubfighter, so the Empire is unlikely to actually use them. I have no idea, how much money they must have sunk into the development. Won’t ever appear in large numbers, though. It’s too pricey. As far as our source can tell, the squadron we’re about to steal is the entire complement that has been built so far. We can even steal the plans.”

Harry raised an eyebrow at the emphasis she had placed on the last part.

“The only copy of the plans,” Iabaes clarified, looking rather smug. Not that he would begrudge her any smugness in this instance, as these fighters sounded exactly like something they would want for their operations. Especially the ion cannons and the ordinance launchers, which could usually be loaded with ion torpedoes, were a dream come true for someone, whose profession it was to capture people.

“Won’t that make our affiliation with the Alliance incredibly obvious, if my team started using them?” Harry voiced a concern her last comment had brought up. “A fighter model, the only copies of which were stolen in an illegal raid, suddenly flying for my bounty hunting outfit? Even if it doesn’t connect to the Rebels, it would still brand us as criminals.”

“Ah, not to worry,” the Mandalorian assured, waving him off. “You can release the plans to a shipyard of your choice, for a price and under the condition of anonymity obviously, and soon, you’ll be able to claim you simply ‘bought them fair and square’.”

Somewhat mollified, although he was not quite sure releasing such a capable craft into the hands of possibly hostile forces was a good idea, Harry returned to his droid-prepared scrambled eggs. Not having seen anything even approaching a chicken in this galaxy, he had no real incentive to think about where the eggs had come from.

“What are the dimensions?” he inquired, finally remembering the restrictions the _Lightbringer’s_ limited hangar placed on them.

“Don’t remember the exact measurements,” Iabaes replied between bites, looking at the food warily, still not completely trusting the droid cook. “Your hangar should comfortably fit three, though, even with all that stuff you seem to insist on storing there. You do realise this ship has a small cargo-bay, right? And an armoury, for that matter.”

Harry chuckled darkly. “I am aware,” he replied wryly. “Just didn’t have it in me to have people move that stuff; might have to now, with the new fighters coming in.”

“You have to anyway,” the experienced warrior reprimanded harshly, and from her tone it was clear she meant business. “Generally speaking, you run a rather tight ship, which is a good thing, so don’t get sloppy on the details. Imagine you’re ever being boarded: do you really want weapons to be lying around where the enemy would most easily be able to reach them?”

“Oh shit,” Harry gulped loudly, before he began to shovel the rest of his food and rushed to the training room, where he interrupted Arden’s regularly scheduled muscle training. “Everyone, we’re going for some real-world application of this training. It’s been pointed out that having stuff lying around in the most easily boarded part of our ship is a really bad idea. We’re going to be carrying all that stuff to places more suitable for it.”

Soon after, a group of grumbling crewmembers were carrying crates, both heavy and light, along the corvette’s corridors, their captain in the lead, a group of boxes floating obediently behind him.

In the back of the group, an amused Dathomirian was watching them trudge along.

OOOOOOOO

“You’re ready, have everything you need?” Harry confirmed with Iabaes, who was standing before him in a threadbare outfit that would fit in nicely with the slaves being forced to work on the planet below. “Remember, anything bad happens, you use that portkey to get out of there.”

“I remember,” the Mandalorian replied, both annoyed and touched by the younger man’s concern. “I have the emergency exit, and I have your ‘beacon’ as you called it, just like I have my gear in that little bag you somehow managed to make to not be there, except for the two of us. I am as prepared as I’ll ever be, and this is not my first mission.”

He seemed unhappy with how things had panned out but was obviously resigned to it. “I should be the one doing this…”

“No, you shouldn’t,” the experienced agent reprimanded. “Learn to leave someone else in charge, when they have more experience. You would stick out like a sore thumb amongst my people, even with how well you can blend in. It’s not like I’ll be long; our contact will get me into the work crew employed in the factory and I’ll have you teleport in.”

Without too much more grumbling, Iabaes was finally on her way, being flown to the surface inside the LAAT/i gunship the group had found somewhere and transported the rest of the way on one of the speeder bikes to meet with their man on the inside. This ‘super spy’ turned out to be an Imperial non-commissioned officer by the name of Laycli; not someone she would usually trust easily, given that his reasons were not ideological but monetary, but in this case, the possible gains far outweighed the risks.

“You the one I am supposed to smuggle inside?” the man asked gruffly, looking her up and down with a lecherous gaze. “Your credits better be good, otherwise I’ll… take my payment from you directly.”

Suppressing the instinctive, and admittedly powerful, urge to head-slam this asshole’s nose bad enough that even bacta would have a hard time dealing with it, the warrior smiled sweetly and adopted, as much as that was possible for her, an innocent, naïve persona. Not that it would fool anyone who looked at her.

“But I don’t have any credits on me…” she replied waspishly, looking at the corrupt officer wide-eyed. “I’m sure the transfer of the credits went just fine.”

Obviously not buying her whole spiel, Laycli shuffled her into the back of the speeder he had come with, grunting at her as they went, “Do yourself a favour, pretend you have just been fucked from here to yesterday. That’ll be my cover story for when I take you inside the compound. We have a system in place for that kind of thing.”

Not sure whether to be thankful or disgusted, Iabaes simply remained silent and nodded to indicate she had understood. Assured that she would play along, the man activated the speeder and they shot off, along the ravaged landscape of Concordia, marred with the efforts of mining the rare and priced beskar ore, the damage inflicted by Mandalorian operations easily rivalling that done by the Empire’s efforts.

Little time had passed, when they reached a guard post at the edge of a giant crater, the sound of equipment and explosions heavy on the air. The leer of the men standing guard was impossible to dismiss, and one of them seemed to even wink at the one they must have thought had just had his way with the powerless slave in his speeder. Laycli parked the speeder in the corresponding spot of the vehicle pool and dragged her out.

“Try not to look this haughty,” he sneered at her. “It’s going to get us both killed.”

No more words were spoken until she was eventually pushed into the barracks assigned to the slaves; triple-layered cots, ten of them, in a room that was most definitely too small for this many people. On these cots, wearing clothes like the ones she was to fit in, lay 29 people. The air stank of fear and sweat and ammonia; worst though, was the defeated look many of them had in their eyes. It was almost physically hurtful to see that look in the eyes of a member of her proud people.

“You’re new,” a man stepped to the front of the group. He looked like he might once have been burly, but the treatment he had received at the hands of the Empire had robbed him of any of that. “That bunk’s free, the poor sod fell unconscious while on a work assignment. Name’s Opan, not that it matters anymore.”

Seeing the state these people were in, the proud Mandalorian made a resolution: she would do her utmost to… expand the scope of her assignment.

OOOOOOOO

“Up!” the slave driver called Iabae’s group the next morning after way too short a night, as far as she was concerned. “Lots to do, maggots.”

It was not particularly easy to decide, whether to pity or hate the overseer as he began wandering between the cots, sticking what looked like an electric prod into the bodies of the slaves, both awake and still asleep. Then, she got hit with a jolt too, and suddenly it was easy to decide; hate might have been too strong a word, it was more that she despised him, now. Still, there was a mission to fulfil and that took precedence, not that she would object to later giving the overseer the same treatment as Laycli.

Despite the circumstances, it was a relief, being led out of the stuffy, stinking barracks and into the barely fresher air of the mining and factory complex. Unceremoniously, they were abandoned at a mess hall, where they sat under the watchful eyes of a group of stormtroopers, their identity-purging armour only adding to the gloom of the place. To think that, regardless of how many turns it had taken, these things were based on Mandalorian armour was insulting. Yes, beskar’gam would conceal one’s identity, as much was true, but the armour also had its own identity, with its myriad colours and design choices making it truly unique. Uniqueness was definitely not what she would accuse the Empire of promoting.

Their breakfast, if it could even be called that, consisted of a grey, taste- and odourless goop, slimy and unappetizing, yet Iabaes managed to eat her fill. She had reason to believe she would need the energy, later on, given the state of so many of the actual slaves in this particular hellhole. Nary enough time was given to them to complete their ‘meal’ until the next overseer, this one wearing the kind of protective equipment one would expect of a factory worker, began ushering them along the corridors once again, his prod making a few of the stragglers jump. The factory hall was a loud, if rather clean mass of organised chaos, like Iabaes would have expected from a company such as MandalMotors, especially with the Empire sticking their hands into the business. Much could be said about the Imperials, and a lot of what they did certainly included a great deal of corruption but proclaiming they could not enforce order when they really wanted to, was most definitely a lie. However, what was certainly a pleasant surprise was the general lack of guards in the working areas; sure, a few members of the Imperial Army, and even a pair of stormtroopers, could be seen patrolling around the room, yet their presence was dwarfed by the amount of workers and the efficiency of their surveillance was impeded by the din of machinery. It would make sneaking away to a far-off corner to drop the beacon all that much easier, and that was without even mentioning the possibility of inciting the slaves into a revolt against their oppressors. They would just have to find some way to disable the slave implants and the Imps would be nothing more than stains on the wall.

A few hours of working on the assembly line told the Mandalorian her earlier assessment had been hopelessly romanticised and incredibly, overly optimistic. With how defeated the captive men and women had looked the evening before, she should probably have been prepared for how jaded most of them seemed to her talk of a rebellion without outside help. Nevertheless, she persisted in her attempts to convince at least some that what she had to say had some merit. Admittedly, it riled her up a fair bit how reluctant they were.

“What kind of Mandalorians are you?” the seasoned warrior hissed at the two men and one woman she had finally managed to corner during one of the small breaks, necessitated not by the condition of the workers (something the Empire aggressively did not care about) but by a problem with the machinery.

“The kind that sees when a battle is lost,” the older of the two men rebuffed her. Still, his more practical and less cowed answer was a small victory, as far as Iabaes was concerned.

“Ah, but what if it wasn’t lost?” she speculated. “What if, hypothetically, someone was on their way with weapons, someone with the ability to suppress the signal to the slave implants?”

“If someone like that were on their way, it would change a lot,” he admitted, looking her over speculatively. “Not that I think someone like that exists…”

“And what do we have here?” they heard a deep voice from behind their backs, prompting the four of them to turn around rapidly. “A spy and three traitors…”

The interloper was of rather unimpressive stature, the Mandalorian gathered, but there was something about him that tingled her sense of danger. Maybe it was the blood-red robes, or the supreme confidence with which he approached who he obviously believed to be a spy and a member of a culture known to produce excellent hand-to-hand combatants.

Or maybe it was the number of small cylinders at the man’s belt, signature weapons of both Jedi and Sith.

“I would advise against attacking me,” the man said glibly, hands still folded behind his back, supremely smug expression still etched into his face. “Were you inside your armour, you might have a chance of survival. As it stands, you would only doom yourself and everyone else here to a protracted and painful death. Not that that is not in your own personal future…”

Upon the man’s gesture, Iabaes looked around the room, for the first time noticing that each and every door had opened, throngs of stormtroopers now holding the workers at gunpoint. Admitting a temporary setback was certainly not something she liked doing, but in this case, anything else was folly. Therefore, she did the only thing she could: she dropped the heavily enchanted (at least that was the word Harry had used) beacon that would lead her team’s portkey journey and raised her arms. Within moments, the white-armoured henchmen of the Emperor were upon her and she was led away.

“I must admit, I did not think it would be this easy to get caught,” she freely admitted to the man walking next to her.

He requited her admission with a cruel smirk.

“No one expects the Imperial Inquisition.”

Nobody noticed that, behind them, inside the room, a young woman with ashen hair had bowed down to the ground to pick up the small bracelet Iabaes had dropped.


	22. ...The Imperial Inquisition

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: The Star Wars and Harry Potter copyrights lie with their respective owners, should any of them have any problem with my story being shared, I will comply with their wishes and remove it from circulation.  
> Please do not copy this work or any part of it.

“Is everyone geared up?” Harry asked the ground team, plus the remaining Spec Ops team, who had all gathered around him. “You have the weapons?”

The last part had been directed at Javoc, whose task it had been to gather an assortment of weaponry and other equipment from the stocks they had acquired during their various missions. Unsurprisingly, he had taken to his assignment with glee, happily picking what he considered the most appropriate tools to oppose the likely to be heavy Imperial presence.

With nods all around confirming everyone’s readiness, Harry pulled up the portkey he had made and linked to the beacon Iabaes had taken with her on her mission. She was clearly instructed to drop the small item in a wide-open area, where the attack party was then supposed to arrive. With or without notice from her, she knew they were coming after two days. As one, the group gathered around, grabbed the rope, and waited. Disconcerting as it was to use a portkey, the young wizard was happy to note that with repetition came resilience, and the feeling of having a hook behind his navel was not nearly as weird as it had once been; he even considered the possibility that he might not make a fool of himself when they eventually landed.

That hope was cruelly dashed, though; immediately upon arrival, not a small number of them was hit in the face by sturdy metal.

“Merlin, what did she do?” Harry complained as he gathered his wits, only to finally notice what had gotten his head to ring like it did: where there should have been an empty area was what he would call a barracks, though not the kind he would put soldiers in, whose loyalty and fighting spirits were somewhat important. It was more of a prison, maybe labour camp atmosphere. Then, he noticed the eyes of the entire room on himself.

Immediately, he used the same spell he had used on the surveillance equipment on the shuttle when they had fled Dathomir, what now seemed so long ago. Having secured the continued secrecy of their mission for the time being, the wizard finally had time to take off his mask and take a look around, the first thing to grab his attention being the bed he had landed next to, as well as its occupant, who was now indignantly pushing Arden off of her. The young woman had ashen hair, piercing, emerald-green eyes, and the stance of a warrior, if what Harry had been able to glean from Arden and Iabaes was any indication. She had proceeded to push the Dathomirian witch off of her, and without much further interaction, was enveloped by a turquoise light and simply… vanished.

Now, being a wizard himself, people vanishing was not all that uncomfortable or uncommon for Harry to witness, but it did not seem to be an ability wide-spread in this reality, and the woman’s continued presence in a place like this while she could obviously have left at any time, indicated she had had her own reasons to be there.

Aside from his musings, the captain, decked out in the Alliance-themed suit of armour, took in their surroundings; they were definitely in some sort of prison barracks, though that might not be all that bad. Worrying, however, was the complete absence of their Mandalorian ally and, dare he say, friend.

“Are you those people that woman was talking about?” an older, somewhat less-beaten looking man came to the forefront of the gathering their entrance had, understandably, attracted.

“Brown hair, thirties, warrior’s physique?” Arden inquire at that, looking suspiciously at the speaker, who nodded. “Where is she?”

“She was taken away by the Inquisitor,” came the prompt reply, and even though Harry did not know what exactly the man was talking about, anyone with that kind of title could only be bad news.

“When?” he demanded briskly, perhaps a bit harsher than it would have been necessary.

“Yesterday,” who now started to appear to be a leader among the prisoners replied, though he did seem somewhat displeased with Harry’s rudeness. “She said you would bring weapons and a way to block the signal to the slave implants.”

With a sharp nod, the captain indicated for Javoc and Corsek to get going; the latter started handing out E-11s, even as the former began distributing the small jamming devices Palestro and he had cooked up over the preceding days.

“These are small signal jammers,” he told the group, just as he was giving the first to their spokesman. “They inhibit the termination signal to the slave implants, but their battery time is limited, and they only work on one person. So, if we don’t want someone to take the entire rest of the prison population hostage, we better find a way to disable that possibility. Where is the command centre?”

“I’ll lead you there,” the older man offered. “Dark Cruufyn, at your service. Might I know your name?”

“Captain Potter,” the wizard responded curtly; Iabaes was someone he considered to be, at least for the moment, under his remit. Therefore, her being in danger made him become rather curt, if he was being honest. “Talk later, let’s do this now.”

No more words were exchanged, as the Mandalorian prisoners and the complement from the _Lightbringer_ quickly left behind the room, its door opened by an unlocking charm courtesy of the ring the ship’s captain was wearing on his left index finger. Outside in the corridor, they came upon the first enemy.

He was a young-looking, quite obviously bored army trooper, disinterestedly leaning against the wall opposite the doors of the barracks. Before anyone, very much including Harry, could say anything, the man was hit in his unprotected neck by a short-range blaster bolt. Just as he was about to say something, maybe reprimand the shooter, Cruufyn spoke up.

“Don’t bother,” the Mandalorian stepped in. “Had you known what this man has routinely done, you would have shot him too.”

With a shrug, as well as the insight that any attempt at holding back people as angry as these would be not only a futile, but also a possibly dangerous endeavour, Harry turned back around, following after their guide. Still, something needed to be said.

“The first officer you see, you stun,” he ordered the group, taking note of several mutinous expressions all over. “I need them for intelligence. And take this one’s armour.”

Angry as they were, the gathering of intelligence on their opponents was something the Mandalorians understood, transforming the formerly annoyed looks all over the group to ones of grudging acceptance. With their overwhelming numbers, swelled as they were by the prisoners from any cell they passed, any opposition was quickly quashed; of particular comedic value was one of the factory slave overseers who, upon spotting the approaching group, began rapidly tapping around on his panic button, intended to detonate all the implants in his immediate vicinity. Noticing that nothing was happening, he drew out his blaster pistol and was quickly felled by three shots, once again hitting in vulnerable areas of his body.

At one point, the group was accosted by two uncommonly courageous adversaries, the kind of which Harry had not seen before. The two were wearing somewhat modified versions of the standard stormtrooper armour, less heavy, but allowing for more mobility. Yet, the most striking feature were their staff weapons, crackling electricity on both ends, not all that much unlike the one on the wizard’s back, which he was now almost automatically going for.

Then, in the middle of their charge at the group, a flurry of blaster bolts took the two down, as well.

“Really, Boss,” Arden objected, “were you actually about to duel them? That’s not an advantage we want to give our enemies, right? Fighting in their preferred method…”

Getting caught in a moment of misdirected fairness, Harry was happy that his mask was obscuring his blush; he had a certain feeling that might have lessened his command authority. Still, one good thing to come out of the confrontation was the glee with which Arden was now whirling around her newly acquired electrostaff.

On and on they went, from corridor to corridor, finally hammering home the real extent of the Imperial operation they were up against, and despite the relative lack of resistance, a feeling was niggling in the back of the captain’s mind that something was decidedly off…

That something turned out to be waiting for them in the next room.

There, in front of the entrance to the control room, stood a man. Blood-red, ankle-long robes draped over a decidedly unimpressive physique and, if Harry was not completely mistaken, some armour plating. On his belt he had a collection of silver cylinders, lightsabres, on his face a cruel, superior smile.

“Go the other way around,” the wizard ordered the group, the moment he laid eyes on the dark Jedi, or whatever else he might be. Now, he knew what he had felt: similar to Vader, if significantly weaker. “I have a feeling this one will not easily be hit with blasters, do you agree?”

Though none of Harry’s forced levity seemed to be able to take hold with the escapees and his ground team, the general consensus seemed to be that he was most likely correct. As such, it was he and Arden that remained, standing opposite the red-robed figure, her newly acquired electrostaff bristling with energy, even as his staff’s non-lethal part had withdrawn, exposing the glinting blades at both ends.

“How very amusing of you to think you might beat me,” the man chortled, the cruel smile splitting his face almost in half. “Your weapons shall make worthy trophies on my wall.”

“You’re this Inquisitor I’ve been hearing about, I presume?” Harry inquired acidly; the man reminded him too much of some of the Death Eaters to tolerate his presence any longer than necessary.

“Why yes, that is me,” he chortled, sounding more and more deranged as he went. “And you’re the back-up for that foolish Mandalorian I captured, right? Well, maybe bringing her news of your demise might get her to talk. I would be most interested in finding out, how you got in here.”

With that, the man drew his own lightsabre from among the gathering of trophies along his belt, a long crimson blade extending from a dark hilt. “Time to die.”

OOOOOOOO

Iabaes Kurn was not completely sure, how long she had been strapped to the chair, or how often that Inquisitor had come and tried to rummage through her head, it could not have been more than a few days, she ventured. Still, despite her severely weakened state, she was content in the knowledge that anytime he had come, the man had left, frustrated and scared.

Frustrated with her resistance and scared of his superiors.

Her people had been fighting Jedi and their ilk for decades, nay centuries, and she would not let herself be overcome by one of them, whether he may be a former Jedi, dark Jedi, or even a Sith.

In the distance, she could hear the sounds of guns firing, the thud of bodies hitting the floor, screams of pain and fear. Then again, she was so delirious at this point that it had become hard to distinguish between fact and fiction, hallucination and reality.

Another pain-filled cry, much closer this time. It sounded rather real…

Without warning, the cell door was opened, and the bright light of the corridor flooded the cold, sterile room, even as the face of the man she had spoken to just before her arrest appeared in the doorframe.

“Ready to get some revenge?”

OOOOOOOO

A good deal of lightyears away, although not all that much on a galactic scale, around a green moon orbiting an orange gas giant, a young, white-clad woman was frantically speaking into a mirror.

“Harry Potter,” she espoused the mirror repeatedly, only to be met by the stony silence of her own face reflected back at her once again. Frustratedly, she threw the communication device away, even though she regretted her actions the moment she did. Luckily, the precious gift had landed safely on her bed, still whole and unblemished.

Yet also without the picture of the person she was hoping to see.

“Princess Leia, you should really be preparing your things,” the gold-plated form of the protocol droid C-3PO, standing in her doorway, admonished in his almost accent-free Basic. “I fail to see how getting Master Harry here would help. The odds of him being able to defeat a fleet such as this are…”

“Shut your vocabulator,” Leia told the voice brashly, another action she regretted almost immediately; if droids could look ashamed, this one was doing exactly that now. “Sorry, 3PO. I’m just worried that I can’t reach Harry.”

“Understandable, Princess. Though it could probably be considered wise to worry about our own predicament,” the droid remarked, playing rather unsubtly at the fact that, without much warning, a fleet had appeared in the system and started a large-scale blockade of the planet Yavin and its moons. Although what exactly the Imperials were waiting for was not all that clear, it was almost guaranteed to be bad news.

 _“Princess,”_ the communicator unit mounted on her belt chimed up with the voice of General Dodonna. _“Skywalker is back, and he brings news.”_

“I’ll be right there, General,” Leia responded, quickly striding out of her room, one gold-plated droid on her heels. Nervously shifting her weight from foot to foot as she rode the turbolifts to the command centre, she considered their situation, and could not help but feel rather hopeless for a second; there were several star destroyers picketing all around the moon on which the Rebel base was located, and the sophisticated sensors had picked up the signatures of several artificial gravity wells at key positions all around the system.

“Damn interdictors,” the princess muttered under her breath. Even if Harry could somehow manage to break through the blockade, his corvette would be hopelessly outmatched. Unless of course…

“Princess Leia? Princess Leia,” 3PO woke her out of her musings, signalling stiffly at the open doors. Throwing a thankful nod at the helpful droid, she continued her walk to the Alliance headquarters’ command centre, where she was already being expected. The one bright spot in all of this, as far as she was concerned, was that Mon Mothma’s presence was only by hologram, their leader being far away from the trap they had now found themselves in.

“Princess,” Dodonna greeted, even as the other participants of the meeting turned around, looking at the newest addition rather grimly. “Continue, Lieutenant Skywalker.”

“As I said, they were working on a gigantic new ship, the _Executor_ ,” the young man went on with a report he had quite obviously already started. “The thing is nineteen kilometres long and was supposed to leave Fondor any moment, when I made my escape. R2 has the schematics.”

“So, basically another Death Star, only just a little more flexible,” Leia observed sounding calmer than she really felt. “Another weapon of fear.”

“What I don’t get is why they’re not attacking,” Luke interjected, looking at the holographic representation of the veritable armada already amassed in the Yavin system. “They have enough ships to reduce the entire planet to slag in a few hours.”

“More fear,” Vernan commented. “A propaganda show; they’ll have to make the destruction of the Rebel Alliance a big, public spectacle now that we’ve shown ourselves to be a credible threat. Their troops will come in with the express orders to capture rather than kill. Skywalker, you said this _Executor_ was Vader’s personal flagship?”

Luke nodded.

“They’re waiting for him,” Cracken concluded morosely. “ _‘Supreme Commander Personally crushes Murderous Traitors’_ has a certain ring to it, does it not?”

None of them had it in them to rebut him, for they all seemed to have the exact same thoughts.

“Have the flight crews prepare the fighters and the transports, put every bit of ion weaponry on them that we can,” Dodonna finally ordered. “These interdictors are their main weakness; if we can take out one and manage to disable only one of the ISDs, we should be able to escape.”

No one appeared to be willing to say how unlikely that seemed without any outside help.

OOOOOOOO

Without forewarning, the Inquisitor leapt into battle, and had he not been an incredibly dangerous foe, Harry would have been hugely impressed with the grace that movement showed. Still, even as he himself was still looking, dumbfounded, Arden had already responded, the crackling of her new electrostaff filling the corridor.

Right between the three combatants’ earlier positions the two met, crimson blade to silver staff and…

The blade simply shorted out. Even the always adaptable witch was too surprised to properly jump onto her opponent’s weakness. For his part, the Inquisitor simply drew a second weapon from his belt, just as he replaced the one, he had been using, in one single fluid motion. What had once been a glowing red was now a deep green blade, with which the man returned to hacking at the Dathomirian.

Shaken out of his stupor, Harry engaged as well, an aggressive swing of his bladed staff targeting his enemy’s legs only stopped by a timely parry that drove the Inquisitor back a few steps, rage bubbling in the man’s eyes. With reckless abandon, the Emperor’s servant charged at them once again, his blade hacking at Arden’s weapon, only to short out as it had before. However, this time, they were both prepared for it, and while the witch got a hit in against his shoulder, prompting his arm to spasm and drop the hilt from his hand, the wizard got their opponent in the middle of his thigh, the vibroblade leaving behind a wide gash.

Blood now flowing freely from his wound, the Inquisitor’s wrath was truly upon them, and any remaining questions about the man’s general state of mind, dare one say sanity, were no longer relevant. With a scream of rage, Harry and Arden were thrown back into the wall, heads ringing with the impact even through armour and bodyglove, and a fraction of a second later, death seemed to be upon them, as the vengeful darksider stood above the young captain with yet another newly ignited lightsabre, ready to deliver the coup-de-grace.

Only, as the strike descended, it was interrupted by a silver staff, which proceeded yet again to short circuit another of his blades. And yet, all was not well, as this time, the lightsabre had finally managed, just before winking out, to destroy the weapon that had been used against its brothers, the electrostaff being cleaved cleanly in half.

“I liked that thing,” Arden complained, just before throwing the still-crackling pieces into her opponent’s face, who quite expectedly managed to easily dodge them. However, he had not been expecting Harry to be back in the fight quite so soon, and the nonverbal, but very potent banishing charm courtesy of the staff he was using came as a rather nasty surprise.

Still, frustrating as it was, and despite his robes and armour plates, the man spun around in the air to land in a low, stable crouch, panting with exertion, just like his two enemies.

“You want one of those swords?” Harry murmured, receiving a sharp nod from his companion. Not resorting to any fanfare, and in the hopes that, considering it was not an attack on him, the summoning would not trigger the Inquisitor’s danger senses, the wizard reached out with his magic, using his ring as a focus, and summoned the crimson-bladed sabre to him. There seemed to be some resistance as the darksider tried to pull back with his telekinesis, yet it was obviously too late.

An interesting observation that would have to be filed away for later, he decided.

“Can you do something like that again?” Arden murmured as the three were circling each other. “Maybe not something like an attack, but something that affects his surroundings? I don’t like this standstill.”

“Those lightsabres don’t like water, right? And they conduct energy?” he reassured himself that he remembered correctly what Obi-Wan had told them about the weapon of the Jedi and the Sith. Seeing his companion nod, the young wizard directed, “Good. You distract him. When I say now, make ready to be pulled away.”

Doing as instructed, the Dathomirian once again went back into the fray, although it was obvious that, fed as he was by the power of his own hatred, the Inquisitor was the stronger of the two. Harry, meanwhile, tried to find even the barest minimum of peace of mind, drawing his wand into his right hand; what he was planning to do would require a bit more finesse than his staff could achieve.

The first thing he did was erect a ward, not unlike the ones Hermione had erected what seemed like a lifetime ago; probably not as strong, but it would do what it was supposed to. Then he gave his all to a spell he had never considered to be particularly useful in a combat application; with a wave of his wand and a strong push of magic, a huge amount of water began spewing out of the tip, dousing both combatants and shorting out any sabre they still had on their person.

“Now,” Harry called and summoned the witch through the intent-based ward. “This might sting a little.”

Then, he enveloped the doused Inquisitor in the blue-white fire of lightning.

OOOOOOOO

Once again decked out in her beskar’gam, her Mandalorian armour, even her weakened state could not hold Iabaes Kurn back; she wanted revenge, for herself and her people.

“Take prisoners if you can, kill them if you must but don’t risk the lives of the slaves,” she ordered the group that made ready to storm the command centre. “Captain Potter is very effective in extracting information, I’m being told, so one should suffice.”

The ground team from the _Lightbringer_ , whose familiarity with the wondrous things their leader could do was out of question, immediately nodded their assent; seeing their allies agree certainly had a steadying effect on the freed slaves, as they too acknowledged the order.

“Morquen, breaching charge; Tevo, Sestac, flash-bangs,” Corsek instructed, and the three Rebel soldiers moved to comply. Within short order, the shaped charges had been set onto the metal of the door, and the troops made ready to storm the room. “Breach.”

In execution, if Iabaes did say so herself, the attack was almost flawless, and she was happy to see how well these two different groups worked together. Following the detonation of the disabling explosives, they rushed the room, and though a few of the officers and technicians tried to resist, one of them even managing to clip a freed slave with a blaster shot, it was obvious that these people were not trained for combat, many of them not even outfitted with a side-arm. Had the factory been a Mandalorian operation, things might have been different, of course, but the Empire had a propensity for discouraging the widespread issuing of blasters among its ranks.

“Javoc, Iabaes,” Corsek called, standing next to a large console, the purpose of which became clear as soon as she got a closer look at it. “I don’t know this stuff well enough to deal with it.”

So, it was her and the former Imperial technician (granted, his specialty had been vehicles) that got to work on the central control station for the slave implants. As might have been expected, there was a control that would allow them to immediately detonate the devices buried inside the prisoners, all of them at the same time; it made a sick kind of sense, really. However, it was equally expectable that the Empire would not include an option to disable them, all in one go.

That was not something the Imperial designers seemed to expect would happen anytime soon.

This particular design choice left them with the unenviable task of selecting every single slave’s data that was stored inside the console and manually override the controls for the implants. Busy work, nothing more, nothing less. Meanwhile, Corsek was organising their fighters.

“I want teams of five, each with at least one of our crew, to sweep the installation,” he ordered to nodding from the assembled mishmash of Rebel Spec Ops soldiers, his own crew and freed slaves, who even now were pulling the armour from stunned Imperials to wear themselves. “Every team sweeps one level, if you encounter any resistance you can’t overcome, don’t play heroes, call for backup. We’re looking for the M14-X prototypes, someone able to fly them, any weapons, some transports to get out of here, the labs, each and every piece of beskar you can find, and of course every slave in this building who wants to be freed. If you find any of these things that can’t walk themselves to the hangars, call in. Understood?”

A smattering of approval went through the ranks and the teams of five quickly found themselves, leaving for their assigned tasks with a fervour that showed Iabaes to be far from the only one whose fighting spirits had been awoken. Meanwhile, the SpecOps team’s medic was tending to the wounded slave in one corner, and it seemed they would make it; a large scar was to be expected of course, but nothing majorly impacting function. Additionally, battle scars were often a point of pride for a Mandalorian.

“Did they manage to send out a distress signal?” the seasoned warrior asked the man who had taken up residence at the communications console, still tapping away furiously at her task of disabling slave implants.

“No, we were lucky,” her comrade replied; a rather fresh recruit to their cause, he was a young man from the Outer Rim, an orphan whose real name had been lost to the same ship crash that had killed his parents. These days, everyone just called him by his chosen nickname, ‘Slicer’; it was what he was best at, really. “They have the whole facility under a communication black-out, the only transmitter capable of reaching orbit is in here, and by the time the command staff knew something was going on, it was too late, it seems.”

“Lucky, indeed,” Iabaes murmured. She had seen the Imperial fleet in orbit, and she had absolutely no interest in getting their attention onto them.

OOOOOOOO

When the blinding blue light of the electrical attack Harry had unleashed on the Inquisitor receded, it quickly became obvious that the fight was very much over. His and Arden’s opponent lay on the ground, wheezing, large swathes of his skin burned by the crackling lightning. Still wary, the wizard summoned all the lightsabres to him before he dispelled the already weakened ward he had erected across the corridor and approached the fallen warrior.

“So, you have the courage to use… real power,” the man wheezed, short of breath; whether that was due to pain or a direct effect of his injuries, Harry was not sure. Not that it really mattered, given that he was most certainly lethally wounded.

Looking into the pained, crazed eyes of his fallen opponent, the wizard engaged his legilimency and found himself lightly rebuffed; still, even the most competent practitioner of the mind arts would be weakened in this state, and so the barriers the Inquisitor had erected inside his mind were like paper before a lightsabre to the probe hammering away at them. As he receded from the man’s mind, Harry was ready to puke all over the corridor; the things this one had done and had had done to him were incredible.

“I am… almost impressed,” he wheezed. “The Jedi would… never have used… such a technique.”

“Well,” the wizard replied, still feeling an odd mix of pity and revulsion for the broken shell of a human lying before him. “I’m no Jedi, never will be, don’t agree with them.”

“Not that it will… change anything,” the Inquisitor chuckled darkly, the last vestiges of his formerly wide cruel smile once again appearing on his face. “When Lord Vader… is through with those Rebel… scum. I hear he’s… already underway.”

Harry did not stay long enough to watch the light leave his opponent’s eyes, he was already on his feet and moving toward the command centre, pulling the mirror out of its protected pouch.

OOOOOOOO

AN: Hi all,

did you recognize the easter egg? If you did, let me know.

Greetings,

alexandertheII


	23. M14-X's Maiden Flight

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: The Star Wars and Harry Potter copyrights lie with their respective owners, should any of them have any problem with my story being shared, I will comply with their wishes and remove it from circulation.  
> Please do not copy this work or any part of it.
> 
> AN: Hi all,  
> For the last three chapters I have decided to post them all in one day, as they are more of an entity than three separate ones. Enjoy the ending of this story, for now at least. After all, the end of one story is always only the beginning of a new one.

“The transports are loaded, but any attempt at punching through their blockade will likely lead to heavy losses,” General Dodonna announced to the congregated officers, all of them staring at the holo-map inside the command centre. “We don’t have enough ships to disable both their Immobilizer and one of their destroyers. We would have to fly right through their turbolasers, because if we don’t take out that Interdictor, no one makes it out…”

“Great,” Solo grumbled at the back of the room, where he was nonchalantly leaning against the wall. “I should have taken my money and left… No Chewie, I do not think us being here is for the best.”

Some more grumbling from the smuggler’s Wookie companion was enough for everyone to guess that the great Chewbacca did not agree, but few of the gathered were actually able to understand him, and Leia most certainly was one of them.

“Still, it’s the only chance we have,” Cracken interjected solemnly. “Any kind of fleet capacity we still have left around the galaxy is either too small to be able to help or too far out. That is if we even reach them, with the Empire scrambling all comms…”

Even as the man said what he did, multiple pairs of eyes turned toward the princess; where she knew Harry would have been very uncomfortable with the sudden attention, she had been standing in the spotlight her entire life and simply accepted it.

“I have tried to reach him, but he did not pick up,” she informed the officers, to their great dismay. “As far as I know, they were supposed to be storming an Imperial factory and mining complex to steal some kind of prototype fighter, resources and weapons. They were also trying to…”

She never finished what she was about to say, for in that very moment, the very mirror they had been talking about began vibrating in earnest. Within the blink of any eye, Leia had accepted the call and soon, the face of Harry Potter, still wearing his helmet, his mask dangling off to the side, appeared on the shiny surface.

“Hey, Harry…” the princess began, only to be immediately cut off.

“You have to get out of there,” the young wizard’s almost panicky voice sounded through the connection. “Vader is on his way to you, he must have found out about the base, somehow.”

Overcoming being momentarily stunned by both his vehemence and that manic edge to his tone, Leia replied, “We know, although confirmation that Vader himself is coming is helpful. They have a blockade up that we don’t have the resources to overcome.”

“Then we’re going to get underway, we can break through…”

Sweet as his concern was, she had to interrupt him. “Sorry, Harry, but they have six destroyers all around the system,” Leia said earnestly. “The _Lightbringer_ is a good ship, and most likely able to trump most pirates out there, but it won’t hold its own against even one ISD. You’d be shot down in seconds.”

“Well, there must be something we can do…” the captain’s frustration was now clearly evident in his tone of voice.

“Unless you have some way of delivering a large enough ion payload to disable an Imperial Star Destroyer, there’s nothing you can do, Captain Potter,” General Dodonna interjected. “We’ll have to make do with what we have and hope for the best. Our Y-Wings can take out their Interdictor to allow us a jump to hyperspace while the X-Wings hold the TIEs from the destroyer next to it at bay.”

Unlike what she had expected to see, which would have been resignation and, though it possibly sounded somewhat vain, pain at her probable demise, there was now a gleam of hope in Harry’s eyes.

“Let me get back to you on that,” the wizard said jauntily, and before the link was cut, they could already hear him speaking into his commlink. “See if you can find ion warheads for those M14s. We’ll need everything we can get.”

OOOOOOOO

From the side of the nineteen kilometre long behemoth that was the _Executor_ , proud flagship of the Imperial Navy, arose a comparatively tiny speck of white-grey; obviously, if one were to stand right in front of the Lambda-class shuttle, it would still tower above almost any sentient being, but relative to the star dreadnought the hangar of which it had just cleared, the ship seemed like an ant next to an elephant. As quickly as its engines could push, the small craft cleared the gravity well its mothership was stuck in while preparing for yet another jump to hyperspace and, taking the same route its much bigger relative was scheduled to, vanished into hyperspace.

The only being on board, besides a black astromech, was Darth Vader, Lord of the Sith. He could not tell, whether it was the burning hatred inside his reactor heart that was spurring him on, or whether it was indeed the Force that had given him a push, but somehow he knew that the _Executor’s_ arrival would be too late for what he really wanted to achieve: the destruction of the Alliance.

This last vestige of chaos inside the New Order, his New Order… His Master’s New Order.

For now, for with the Rebellion he hoped to find the young man who, now months prior, had so easily thrown off his attack on the Death Star. Starkiller had been a failure, as much had to be admitted, despite his massive potential; his training had taken too long and drawn the attention of the Emperor, making the boy useless as a ‘secret’ weapon.

The one he had met in that hangar, though…

That one already had power unlike anything Vader had ever seen before. While a strong Jedi might have been able to shield against his attack, the ability to so easily reflect it back was unheard of.

With an almost scared series of beeps, the black R2 unit informed the Sith lord they had reached the edge of the gravity well, so with a burning desire to find what he would need to finally take what he had paid so much for to achieve, Darth Vader pulled the lever activating the hyperdrive and starlines filled the viewport.

OOOOOOOO

“The Rebel base is in trouble,” Harry announced, even as he and Arden stepped through the somewhat sizzled door of the command centre. “They have a blockade in the system they don’t really know how to punch through and Vader on the way there with who knows what kind of invasion force. Have the teams found any ammunition for those fighters?”

Iabaes, who was still working on deactivating the implants of all the slaves inside the facility, looked at him dubiously. “How would one squadron of fighters, great as these ships might be, be able to turn the tide of an entire battle?”

“It wouldn’t,” the wizard agreed readily. “Doesn’t need to, either; we just have to disable one single destroyer long enough for the Alliance to make a run for it, while their Y-Wings take out their interdictor.”

“Uh, Boss…” Corsek interjected, “Not to be all pessimistic, but we’ll be shot to pieces if we show up there with the _Lightbringer_.”

“Then we don’t,” Harry responded quickly. “Those fighters have hyperdrives, right? We park the _Lightbringer_ in a neighbouring system, put our own astromechs inside the M14s, do our thing and then rendezvous somewhere else.”

“Still, those sound like steep odds…” the former Imperial began once again but was quickly cut off by his boss.

“I won’t force you to join me,” he declared harshly, even as he tried to control his temper by breathing deeply. “I can’t just give her… I mean them up. I can’t lose someone else…”

Suddenly deeply exhausted, Harry sank down onto the commander’s chair, his breath coming in a cadence that made it seem almost like hyperventilating. He simply could not stomach the idea of someone else close to him dying, not if there was even the slightest chance of him doing something against it. And as far as he was concerned, knowing about the potency of ion weaponry, there was more than just a slight chance.

“Alright, Boss,” Corsek said, visibly forcing himself to calm down as well. “I didn’t mean it like that; I’m no starfighter pilot, anyway, so I wouldn’t be any help. It seems like we’ve enough volunteers as is, though.”

Unnoticed during Harry’s small emotional breakdown, from the by-now enormous group of rescued slaves, who against their earlier orders had congregated in and around the command centre of the facility, at least thirty had stepped to the front, proudly standing at the ready.

“You know this will be dangerous, right?” the wizard asked them, deeply touched by their willingness to sacrifice, even after what they had just heard. “There’s a good chance people are going to die in this.”

In all their eyes Harry could see nothing but conviction and a burning hunger for revenge against their oppressors.

OOOOOOOO

Around him, people were bustling about, from one end of the hangar to the other, from transport to transport and from depot to fighter craft.

The secret factory’s massive main hangar had, to everyone’s delight, housed not only a number of transports, which the slaves would be using to escape, but also an ammunitions depot for the various kinds of warships, many of them looking like they were far from standard. Pride of place at the side wall held a group of red-tinged fighters.

These vessels had a certain intimidating factor to them, though Harry found the exact reason for that hard to place; the red colour, which Iabaes had informed him stemmed from the havod alloy used in their construction, certainly contributed, but the entire craft had the feeling of a predator to it. Now, it was not all that large by any definition one could use, merely measuring around the same length as an X-wing, and maybe half as wide, but the sharp lines bristling with weapons told their own story. Having seen the ships’ cockpits from inside, he was convinced he could easily fly one, considering how much it seemed like they were designed to be friendly to the user, and it was also very much understood that he would.

Still, all the hustle and bustle going on around him did not permeate Harry’s senses all that much, given how riveted he was onto the worried face of the young woman inside his mirror.

“How long would that take?” Leia sked, having listened to his description of their plan to ride to the rescue in their newly acquired fighters. “And please don’t throw your life away if you don’t think there’s a chance it will lead to anything.”

For someone with a ‘saving people thing’ though, the situation was just too tempting. “Don’t worry,” Harry tried to project all the optimism he could. “We’re going to be ready in just a few hours, then around a day of travel time. The Imps won’t know what hit them.”

Truthfully, he was not feeling even half as hopeful as he portrayed himself to be, possibly for his own benefit the most of all. Yes, from everything he had heard, these Imperial Star Destroyers were incredibly vulnerable to small fighter craft who somehow managed enough of a punch to annoy the interstellar behemoths; still, they also had dozens of TIE fighters of their own, not to mention what kind of escort the Empire might have sent along in smaller, more nimble ships. Yet, he was committed to at least trying, for in his mind, there remained a good enough chance of success.

“Hey, you still there?” his musings were interrupted by the one he had been talking to. Harry shook his head to get rid of his troubled thoughts before he looked at her intently.

“Yeah, just… thinking,” he said distractedly, still thinking over their tactics for the ridiculously disparate battle they were about to face. “Hey, could the people from the base take out that destroyer you need out of the way? It’s closer to the moon than the interdictor, right?”

“I’ll have to ask…” Leia responded, even as the background of their mirror call began shifting with her movement. “General Dodonna, a moment please…”

“Yes, what is it?” the (to Harry) non-visible officer snapped, the stress of his situation quite obviously getting to him. “Sorry, please, go on.”

“Captain Potter wanted to talk to you,” the princess informed the man primly, as if somewhat pissed off after being unduly snapped at. Nevertheless, she rotated the mirror (and if that was not a weird sight) and handed it over.

“Captain Potter, what is the matter?”

Seeing the normally dignified general this haggard was certainly worrying, as far as Harry was concerned. Dodonna had bags under his eyes that bespoke the lack of sleep the evacuation and the blockade had exacted on him, while his tone was graver than ever before.

“Do you think your fighters could take out the ISD that’s blocking your evacuation route?” the wizard inquired hopefully; if this worked, things might just work out as a whole, too. “As I understand it, it blocks approach to the enemy Immobiliser cruiser. Our current target allocation would have my people fly past the interdictor to attack the destroyer while yours would have to fly past the ISD to get to the interdictor.”

Visibly pondering what he had been told, and probably mentally slapping himself over the head for not thinking of it himself, Dodonna hummed a little, deeply in thought.

“We should be able to do that,” he finally analysed glumly. “We would lose some fighters, but it would not be the first time a wave of Y-wings disables a capital ship. You’d still have to contend with that interdictor’s defence grid, though.”

“Wouldn’t worry about that all too much,” Harry reassured with a chuckle. “I have some Mandalorians very unhappy with the Empire willing to help out, and I hear they’re excellent pilots.”

OOOOOOOO

Space around the gas giant Yavin still seemed as empty as space had a tendency to do, despite the veritable armada gathered around the Rebel Alliance’s base, for what was a ship of 1600 metres compared to the vast emptiness of the void? What were six of them and a few even smaller ones?

Truly, a competent military commander would have been appalled by the lack of support ships, especially with the traitors’ propensity for using starfighters, but the only ship that really mattered, the interdictor, was well protected; not even the Rebels would fly past an ISD to attack another ship, it was simply suicidal. And it was a simple fact that, with the destruction of Alderaan and the subsequent loss of Tarkin’s pet project, unrest all over the Empire needed quelling; even gathering what he had managed to had incurred the wrath of several local moffs who feared their positions being weakened due to a loss of fleet capacity, while system after system went into open rebellion.

For the moment though, things seemed peaceful, and no one accosted the Dark Lord of the Sith on his approach to the location of the Alliance base where he hoped to be able to find his quarry…

Yes, with that young man on his side, he might finally be able to overthrow his own Master once and for all, take his rightful place in the galaxy.

Finally destroy the shadow that had become everything to him, after destroying everything else.

A group of TIE fighters on combat patrol appeared on his scanners, and by their changed trajectory it was obvious they had spotted him, too. Moments later, it became equally as obvious that they had received his transponder codes, as the squadron of twelve vessels veered off, unwilling to interrupt the Supreme Commander in his personal mission. As Vader slowly dropped through the clouds, a presence washed over him that incited an incredible rage inside, burning hotter than even the black flames usually smouldering in his heart.

“Kenobi,” he tried to snarl, yet only the mechanical sound of the vocabulator came out. How fitting that, on the day would finally find the way to overcome his Sith Master, he would have the long-awaited chance to kill his Jedi master.

It seemed the Force really was with him on that day.

OOOOOOOO

Having spent several hours inside the rather cramped confines of the M14-X experimental starfighter, not to mention having peed inside a bottle (and the less mentioned of other bodily functions, the better), Harry Potter was not in what one could call a cheery kind of mood. Still, to say he was not keyed up and raring to go would have been wrong, as well. For despite the obvious problems associated with their method of travel, one thing could be said for certain: flying was incredible fun.

At each hyperlane intersection where they had had to drop from hyperspace, cross a gravity well and then reengage the hyperdrive, the small, thrown-together squadron of fighters had engaged in a number of simple manoeuvres, just for everyone to get a feeling for their ships. As far as he could tell, they were excellent, and very user-friendly, too, which someone like him certainly appreciated. One of the Mandalorian volunteers had even shown him how to dial down the inertial dampeners a bit to let him feel the effects of acceleration and give him a bit more of a feeling on how his craft moved.

It had immediately felt more like flying on a broom, while the practice shots some members of his squadron had tried to hit him with had started simply feeling like bludgers. Being hit would be a bit more… permanent, but the concept was certainly related. And it was not like a broom had energy shields, so there was some survivability added for this tin-can that was his only protection from the infinite void.

Even the comparatively boring time spent alone inside the cockpit, stuck in hyperspace along the way to Yavin had been productive, though it had led to him wanting to kick himself in the shin; he had originally dismissed the possibility of applying runic enchantments to the ordinance storage for the launchers included in the fighters, because, he had reasoned, simply coming up with the energy needed to permanently conjure an ion or proton torpedo would be a huge problem. Around an hour into the trip Harry had realised that, if you wanted something to simply explode, after which the job would be done, there was little point to permanently conjuring it.

While it was true that applying these modifications would have taken more time than they had, he could not help but feel annoyed that he had only thought of it when the opportunity had already passed.

On the small panel dedicated to translating the binary of his fighter’s astromechs a few lines of script appeared. Luckily, there had been a way to make the computers use what this galaxy coined the High Galactic alphabet, which for some undefinable reason was exactly the same as the one he had learned at home. At one point, that might warrant investigation, but for the moment, he had other worries.

“Yes, thanks,” Harry told the droid, who had just informed him they would soon be arriving at their destination. With a heartening sigh, the young man who never in his life had considered a career as a fighter pilot, pulled out his communication mirror and spoke at it, “Leia Organa.”

Only seconds passed until the momentarily joyful face of the Alderaanian princess, her beauty only slightly marred by worry and lack of sleep yet enhanced by the sheer determination shining on her face, appeared on the reflective surface. “Harry,” she greeted in a mix of trepidation and relief. “Please tell me you’re close; I don’t know, how much longer I can hold back the evacuation. The longer we wait, the closer Vader gets.”

“Don’t worry, that’s why I’m calling,” the wizard replied jauntily, although he did not really feel like it. “R3 tells me we’re… exactly twenty minutes out.”

“I’ll tell everyone to get ready,” she replied, looking deeply troubled. “A few of the Alderaanian survivors have volunteered to stay behind and blow up the base with as many Imperials inside as they can.”

Although not really sure how, Harry knew she wanted no real answer, that this was more of a case of letting someone know what she was worried about.

“And Harry…”

“Yes?”

“Be careful.”

Without another word, the communication was cut, leaving the young wizard, defeater of dark lords, pilot, bounty hunter and captain (he had done quite a lot for someone so young, he decided) to stew in his own thoughts as he raced through the blue tunnel of hyperspace, time stretching as seconds felt like minutes and minutes felt like hours. After this was over, some recreation would be advisable, some shore leave for his crew, maybe an opportunity to teach Arden and Leia about magic.

He very much enjoyed teaching, after all.

Still, even the longest of waits had to be over at some points, and without much warning, the peaceful, hypnotic blue of hyperspace was replaced by the stark blackness of realspace, its expanse only interrupted by the swirling orange of the gas giant Yavin, the lush green of its fourth moon and the two ships belonging to the blockade that were actually visible. Closer to him and his squadron, and yet dwarfed still by the sheer bulk of its larger escort, sat the smaller shape of an Immobiliser-418, the sleek lines interrupted by four massive gravity-well generators, the same ones that had just pulled him out of hyperspace. Behind it in the distance loomed the shape of an Imperial Star Destroyer, the flickering green lights of its turbolasers belying the seeming calm of space.

“Dawn Squadron, you there?” Harry asked his pilots, their impromptu group named in the same vein as his other vessels had been: the edge of light after a period of darkness. He liked the symbolism behind it.

“Dawn two, ready and eager.”

“Dawn twelve, standing by.”

“Dawn five, all clear.”

“Dawn three, all clear.”

“Dawn four, standing by.”

“Dawn six, standing by.”

“Dawn nine, ready.”

“Dawn eleven, all clear.”

“Dawn eight, all clear.”

“Dawn seven, I can hardly wait.”

Had he had more time, Harry would have worried about Dawn Seven’s tone of voice, the mixture of fatalism and pure loathing, burning anger in her voice plain to hear. Yet, given their situation, it would have to be postponed.

“Dawn seven through twelve, keep back and take care of the fighters,” he ordered over the commlink, noting happily that the various pilots immediately acknowledged their assignments via the communications interface. “Dawn two through six, you’re with me. Make ready to hit them with your ion weapons.”

Again, confirmations began rolling in, and for the first time, he began feeling confident that this would work. The interdictor, clearly surprised by their sudden arrival and already on the back foot due to the Alliance’s attack on the destroyer providing their protection, was not in any state to offer meaningful resistance as they closed in. The weaving targets that their small, nimble fighters provided were obviously not what the gunners were used to, and even the few stray shots that actually managed to hit were held back bay the shields.

“I got one on my back,” Dawn Nine announced, surprisingly cool under the pressure of being pelted with shots from a TIE’s laser cannons. “Make that two; my shields can’t hold out much longer.”

In his periphery view, Harry could see the dogfight going on, the red-hued M14 nimbly dodging around in front of the Imperial fighters, yet never able to shake off its two shadows either. Nowhere let it be said the Empire did not train its pilots well.

“Just a moment,” Dawn Eleven’s voice rang through the channel, just before the two pursuers went up into surprisingly large balls of flame, given that they were in space. Probably something internal getting out, the wizard assumed. “You’re welcome.”

“Dawn Squadron, this is Red Leader,” a gentle male voice rang through the channel. “Nice of you to join us. We’ll have approach to the destroyer cleared momentarily, so the Y-wings can go in.”

“Red Leader, this is Dawn Leader,” Harry replied, happy that things were actually going well. “We’re on final approach to the interdictor…”

However, he was interrupted before he could finish. “This is Red Leader,” the same voice returned. “The destroyer launched a group of bombers; they’re headed for our convoy. We can’t break off with these TIEs still around.”

Internally cursing, the wizard was once again ready to kick himself in the shin. Of course, he had to think things were going well; that was always when things started going bad.

“Understood, Red Leader,” he replied, trying to keep the annoyance out of his tone. “Dawn Seven through Twelve, take care of those bombers, then help with the destroyer. We’ll manage without you.”

It was true, after a fashion; the excellent piloting of the Mandalorians, though somewhat lacking in teamwork due to the relative novelty of flying together in this particular group, had left few enemies still around the interdictor cruiser, with only a handful of the crafts Harry himself had once called ‘whiney flying things’ still actually doing exactly that. Once again, the confirmations started rolling along the screen of his comms unit and the newly minted starfighter pilot allowed himself another smile, as he and Dawn Two through Six released a volley of ion torpedoes at their target.

In moments, the imposing craft was dead in the water, so to speak.


	24. Through the Blockade

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: The Star Wars and Harry Potter copyrights lie with their respective owners, should any of them have any problem with my story being shared, I will comply with their wishes and remove it from circulation.  
> Please do not copy this work or any part of it.

“Obi-Wan,” Leia exclaimed, shock etched into her face as Luke’s teacher stumbled mid-step, just managing to catch himself on the side of their transport, the last ship that was to leave their base, hopefully to make an escape, not simply be shot apart under heavy turbolaser fire. “What is it?”

Shaking his head, somewhat reminding Leia of the way Harry would do it when, as he said, he had to ‘clear the cobwebs’, the old Jedi stood back up straight. “I felt a… disturbance in the Force, something I haven’t felt in a long while.”

Kenobi took a little longer to fully gather himself, but he quickly returned to being all-business. “We need to hurry, Vader is here,” he ordered, looking around warily, as if expecting the Emperor’s enforcer to jump out of the shadows at any moment. “He’s been coming closer for a while now but… Something’s wrong, if _Eclipse_ were in the system, we would know. What is he doing here alone, without backup?”

No one really seemed to have the mind to work on that problem, though, as with that pronouncement, preparations took on an even more urgent pace. Even the formerly grim and determined, if rather muted survivors of Alderaan were once again bustling about; if Leia had to guess she would have said they were glad for the opportunity to take their shot at one of the three beings they held most responsible for the destruction of their homeworld and the murders of the entirety of its population. The murders of these people’s family members, friends, their entire lives.

Never one to refuse getting her hands dirty for a righteous goal, the princess kept pushing around the last few supplies still waiting to be offloaded from their hoversleds, securing the crates in the transport’s cargo hold and repeating the same set of actions as often as possible. Even when her very presence was an offense to Alliance High Command, who had been dead set on having her out of the line of fire as quickly as possible, she would never be able to stand by and do nothing. That was not even taking into consideration the fact that what they were loading now were some of the most important things that had been on the base: computers. Sure, they could buy or probably steal more, but what was on those computers was what really mattered; data, lots of it.

She was just watching the last crate be pushed up the loading ramp of their light freighter when all her, admittedly limited, Jedi-senses began tingling. And truly, there in the large hangar doors she could see the figure of Darth Vader, his bulky suit of armour spreading out the dark cape behind him, the fabric hanging limply in the stale air of the jungle moon.

Within a moment, the hisses of two lightsabres were filling the room as the figure of Kenobi ignited his blade to square off against his enemy.

“Kenobi,” the emotionless voice of the machine-man filled the giant room, permeating the space like no single man’s voice ever should. Or maybe it only seemed this all-encompassing to the woman who still heard this voice in her nightmares, from time to time. “We meet again, at last.”

Cumbersome, yet with the certainty of an apex predator that _knew_ nothing, and no one could challenge him, the black figure approached the old Jedi, his sword raised in front of him.

“The circle is now complete,” Vader declared, the lack of an emotional inflection to the voice coming out of his vocabulator making it hard to judge the man’s emotional state within any acceptable margin of error. “Once, you were the master. Now, I shall become the master. Where is the boy?!”

If there had been a brief appearance of shock on Kenobi’s face, and Leia was sure there had been, then she had only managed to guess at it by having watched the man very closely for quite some time now, curious and distrusting of the secret she was certain he was keeping.

“You will not have Luke,” the Jedi declared firmly, and in that moment the princess believed him, even though she was not entirely certain, why he thought Vader would be asking for Luke of all people; it seemed more sensible for this monster to be searching for Harry, the one whose rather… unique talents the Sith had encountered before. “And you cannot hope to win; You are only a master of evil, Darth.”

Yet despite his confident words, just before wading into the fray, Kenobi turned around, looked at Leia beseechingly and ordered her, “Go, now!”

Yet, moved as she was by his emphatic tone, she could not force herself to move her body. Instead, she remained standing at the ramp of the last transport as Obi-Wan put up a token resistance the Sith seemed wary to truly attack; the princess could feel some history there.

“By defeating me, you will make me more powerful than you can ever comprehend,” the old Jedi declared with a certainty that could not have only Leia unnerved. Nevertheless, Vader lunged at him with a wide blow and…

Simply vanished his enemy. And while the black-armoured figure toed the robe of his vanquished enemy, Leia ran into the transport and the ship launched.

OOOOOOOO

Red Five, otherwise known as Luke Skywalker, was trading laser-fire with a group of Imperial TIEs, or ‘eyeballs’, as the other pilots liked calling them. Currently, it was an admittedly one-sided trade, with the Jedi apprentice generously dishing out punishment, relying on his reflexes and the superior tech of his X-wing to stay on top of their nimbler opponents.

“Red Leader, you got two on your tails,” Luke warned their squadron leader, most of the time known as Garven Dreis. “I’ll be on them shortly.”

“Negative, Red Five,” the deceptively calm voice of the older man sounded through their comms channel. “They’ve already managed to separate me and my wingman, there’s an entire squadron between you and me. You’re in charge now, so protect the bomb…”

Nothing more came through as in the distance a ball of fire became visible where only moments earlier the red of an X-wing’s laser cannons had been illuminating the blackness of space. Luke just about managed to hold off a strangled cry at seeing the pilot die; he had been taken under this man’s wings, eased into the transition between a skyhopper, basically a glorified speeder, and an actual fighter. Granted, they were made by the same people, so there was quite a bit of overlap, but the effort was surely appreciated.

“Luke,” Biggs’ voice echoed through the comms unit, sounding a lot like he had said the name before multiple times. “Our orders?”

The newly appointed squadron leader, not that there was much of a squadron left, with what losses they had incurred, took some time to fully immerse himself in the situation: most of the fighters assigned to their target had been taken out, the same was true for the TIEs guarding the interdictor. Where there once had been a wing of bombers making their way to the convoy of transports taking most of what was not bolted down away from their base (a fair few things that _had_ been bolted down as well, now that he thought of it) the only thing that remained was some debris. Most definitely, the single biggest danger for their eventual success was the group of eyeballs now headed for the Y-wing bombers.

“Red Squadron, regroup,” he therefore ordered the other pilots of the now halved force. “Form up on me, increase energy to the forward deflectors and do as much damage on those TIEs as you can. Keep them away from the bombers.”

Confirmations of his orders still ringing in his ears, Luke banked his fighter around, Biggs and the others hot on his tail, even as the script running over the small screen affirmed that the astromech had indeed taken the initiative and diverted energy from their rear shielding to that in the front.

“Thanks, R2,” he mumbled, though it was obviously loud enough for the droid to hear, given that a response appeared almost instantly. “Yes, this is rather risky. We need those Y-wings to reach the destroyer in one piece, though. Otherwise, those transports will be shot down in seconds.”

More words appeared, yet Luke was unable to truly comprehend them, as the two groups came into contact with each other and lasers started impacting the strengthened shields. Just like he himself did it, the enemy fighters were soon squirming around, if such a thing could be said for a metal ball in space, making them hard to hit; nevertheless, applying what he had been learning from Ben, the young Jedi was able to take out three of them by himself, while the rest of Red Squadron managed to off another six. Yet, the feeling of victory was dampened by the loss of Red Four and the beginning of their close-fought dogfights. Here, the TIEs could really bring to bear their superior manoeuvrability.

A harsh tug on the flight-stick had the X-wing in a sharp turn, as Luke did his best to get behind what looked like the lead fighter, hoping that cutting off the chain of command might throw the enemy into some kind of disarray. That was when it happened.

Without warning, a sharp pain of loss erupted in the young man’s chest, and without any real knowledge of the why, he simply knew Ben was no more.

OOOOOOOO

In orbit around Yavin 4, Harry Potter was just about done congratulating himself, when things got more complicated.

 _“We’ve got incoming!”_ Dawn Three said over the comms. _“What the… I don’t know these things, must be new.”_

Shortly, the new arrivals were on his sensor screen as well; twelve sensor contacts moving in quickly, their tight formation betraying the level of skill these pilots must have had to be allowed to fly these new fighters.

 _“Watch out, those look like four laser cannons,”_ Dawn Two announced, obviously having engaged the optical scanning equipment onboard their M14-Xs to take a good look at the oncoming enemies. _“And the bastards are fast, too!”_

“Everyone, follow me,” Harry ordered his squadron, even as he was already banking his fighter around. “We can’t leave as long as the convoy’s still in danger.”

He watched as the other five pilots, those who had not been sent to deal with the bombers going for an attack run on the very ships Dawn Squadron had come to protect, formed up next to and behind him, the red of their hulls in stark contrast to the black and grey of their opponents.

“I want to see what these things can do,” Harry announced, finger at the trigger, while the targeting computer locked in on one of the enemy craft. The squadron leader, incidentally. Then, he pressed down his finger and watched two of the ion torpedoes he still had loaded into the ordinance launcher speed away into the void. Against all reason, he was hoping they would be on target, but in the last moment, the fighter they had been tracking spun out of the way, the projectiles sailing past harmlessly.

 _“Okay, those things can move,”_ Dawn Three commented wryly over the comms. _“And the pilots aren’t half bad either…”_

“Energy to forward deflectors, give them everything you’ve got, then break formation and engage in dogfights,” the newly minted squadron leader ordered his pilots. “Those things are at least as manoeuvrable as a standard TIE, so be careful. Now, fire at will.”

And with that, an utter hailstorm of laser fire began crashing into the oncoming wave of enemies, who clearly had not been expecting this kind of firepower from a craft so small as their M-14Xs. As the lines drew closer, it became apparent that, while faster, more nimble and (if Harry’s shield status was any indication) also more heavily armed than the Empire’s go-to fighter model, the evil dictatorship being what it was, they had not been outfitted with deflector shields. It was a weakness the former slaves of said evil dictatorship were now gleefully using and, by the time their formations broke off, six of their adversaries had already been taken out of the fight.

With a swish of his hand, Harry reallocated energy to equalise shield strength all around his craft, a dogfight being way more chaotic, without any assurance from which direction fire would be coming. He turned his ship around, the light pressure on his body the down-regulated inertia dampeners let through enough to let him really feel the acceleration involved and set himself behind an enemy fighter.

In a way, it was like following after a snitch; a giant, black, dagger-winged snitch, and a rather deadly one at that, but still, a snitch. Slightly more manoeuvrable than he was, as was now becoming clear, but not so much that he was unable to keep up. However, things did get a bit dicey when two of the snitch’s buddies, who seemed to have sussed Harry out as the leader, got on his case. It made the fireball enveloping his quarry much less of a victory.

“Yes, yes, I know our shields are almost down,” the wizard grumbled at the interruption from the astromech squatting in his fighter. “Can anyone get these off…”

While before, things had been like following after a snitch, Harry was now feeling, like he was flying away from a bludger. Or rather, two bludgers; two very persistent bludgers that could not only match him in speed and manoeuvrability but also had the ability to actually shoot at him. So, possibly more like two unusually skilled flyers subbing in as beaters with an unlimited supply of bludgers. And there were no stands around that he might be able to use as…

As if guided by an invisible hand, almost out of necessity for his survival and the continuation of his story, the latest turn had placed him directly in view the adrift immobilizer cruiser, taken out of the fight by Dawn Squadron’s salvo of ion torpedoes. And that command bridge seemed awfully close to the ship’s topdeck. New determination coursed through his veins, as well as a slight bit of trepidation at the idea of what Leia might tell him she thought of his idea. Nevertheless, one further look at the shield readout provided enough incentive to make ‘possibly smash against a larger ship’ seem like a good chance.

“Power to the rear deflectors,” Harry ordered in an effort to buy some time, while the interdictor quickly grew to a worrying size beyond the cockpit canopy. With mere metres left before he would have smashed into the metal plating, he pulled out of his ‘dive’ toward the cruiser and, metres open on three sides of his fighter, he wove through underneath the command bridge, probably scaring a good few officers aboard the enemy cruiser. Of course, that scare was probably compounded upon when, out of the two TIEs pursuing him, only one had the common sense to not do what he had done, while his wingman crashed into, for wont of a better word, the ‘neck’ section. With, most probably, all systems already completely on the fritz, this proved to be the coup-de-grace, for from where it had been rammed, a series of explosions started ripping through the entire hull, quickly enveloping the larger ship.

In the distance, a much smaller fireball could be seen, where there had once been the other of the squadron leader’s two pursuers, one of the other members of Dawn squadron dodging the debris.

 _“Dawn One, this is Dawn Seven,”_ the strained voice of the pilot who had, by nature of their placement in the squadron, taken over command of the fighters that had been sent out to hunt the bombers gunning for the convoy, sounded through the comms unit. _“It was a bit of a struggle, but we managed to mostly keep them away from the transports, only lost one to a lucky torpedo hit.”_

“Acknowledged, outstanding job,” Harry replied, smiling; that could have gone way worse. He then turned attention to the mirror being held in place against the canopy by a sticking charm. “Leia Organa.”

The harried face appearing on the shiny surface was both supremely welcome and disheartening; still, not much more tired than she had seemed earlier. There was something else, though, even though now was most definitely _not_ the time to discuss whatever that might be.

“We’re out,” the princess said without preamble, even her voice somehow radiating how tired she was and how badly she needed a rest. Then, as if gathering her wits for what she was about to say, Leia added, “Kenobi is dead; Luke probably already knows, I’m sure he would have felt it.”

Not sure how he should respond, frankly not even whether he actually should respond in the first place, Harry let that rest for a while. “Thank you for telling me. See you at the rally point.”

“Looking forward to it,” Leia replied earnestly, even though a huge yawn was now gracing her face, before the mirror went blank again.

And then, with all Alliance forces in the field of battle patched in, Harry announced, “Dawn Leader here, the transports are about to jump, we’re withdrawing.”

OOOOOOOO

Interstellar space, Harry realised with a start, was even more empty than a solar system. Granted, that was not a particularly ground-breaking observation, but he found it to be profound enough, especially after he had already accepted the fact that, even the relatively tiny distances _inside_ a system were in reality gigantic. Yet, that paltry size was simply dwarfed by the sheer void that was deep space. In fact, had he not known, where the _Lightbringer_ and the _Morningstar_ were to be found, and subsequently told the Rebels, he was quite sure he could have been searching for multiple lifetimes without ever finding the two ships.

Always ready as he was to sacrifice his own comfort, the captain had offered to be the last one to board the corvette, whose hangar capacity was simply not meant to hold an entire squadron of fighters, as compact as they might be. This limitation had led to the necessity of rotating landing spots: three of the pilots would land their craft, climb out and let their astromech fly off again, thus freeing the space for the next person to land. It was cumbersome and they were quite vulnerable like this, given how limited the piloting capabilities of an astromech were, but they would have to make do with it for the moment.

The last group of pilots, the one including Harry, was just landing in the _Lightbringer’s_ hangar bay when, close by, the Alliance convoy, including both the light transport carrying Leia and the _Millennium Falcon_ , exited hyperspace, the craft quickly gathering around the sleek, dagger-shaped Raider. Climbing out of the cockpit, the only reason the young wizard did not stumble was the big hug he was enveloped in courtesy of a relieved Dathomirian witch, for whom this display of affection was rather unusual; it seemed she had indeed been rather worried.

“Hey, Arden. Nice to see you, too,” Harry mumbled, suddenly bone-weary. “R3, take the fighter out to join the others, will you? I have a feeling we’ll be needing the room.”

With a beep of affirmation, the droid reengaged the repulsorlifts that pushed the ship away from the deck and pushed the throttle, making way for whoever might want to use the hangar space next. Still ensconced in his flight-suit (transfigured, of course), he scuffled to the turbolifts, took one to the crew-deck and made his way to the mess. Shipboard time was not indicative of there being any food available immediately, but he was hopeful that the return of the heroic fighter squadron would warrant at least some rations, for at this point, even completely unmodified Imperial field rations sounded absolutely heavenly.

Arden had remained by his side, even while giving him the information that, as his duty as the first officer demanded, Mercer was on the bridge, overseeing operations and keeping everyone on their toes, should any uninvited visitors arrive; the odds were on their side, but it generally paid not to underestimate the bad guys, Harry had learned. The pilots of Dawn Squadron had also joined their rather quiet victory procession, an air of righteous justice among them, and even Dawn Seven, who had been acting rather worryingly, seemed fundamentally better now. She was even wearing a smile, somewhat offsetting the scars and wounds all over her face.

When, five minutes later, each of them did indeed have a ready-to-eat military ration in front of them, no complaining could be heard. In fact, there was generally little talking done, as each and every one of them was taking in the meal with… well, not gusto, but more a sense of urgency. The cramped conditions in the fighter cockpits had not lent themselves well to in-flight snacking, and the battle, short as it might have been, had taken a toll on everyone. Harry had just reactivated the part of his personal datapad that was mounted on his wrist when the light indicating someone was contacting him began blinking.

“Yes, Mercer?” he yawned at the man. Incredibly rude, obviously, but he had not been able to suppress it.

“Hey, Boss,” his second-in-command said, wide grin on his face. “Glad you survived. We have some Alliance brass asking to come aboard.”

“Of course,” the captain replied instantly. “Why are they even asking?”

Mercer looked at him funnily. “Because this is not an Alliance ship, no matter how some of them might like that to be the case. This is your… sorry, our ship.”

“Fine,” Harry sighed. “Permission to come aboard. There won’t be any debriefing before I catch some sleep though.”

“Aye, Boss,” the older man acknowledged before cutting the feed, once again leaving the returning pilot to his less than appetising meal, of which only a few scant bites remained. These, too, were soon consumed, and the one who had done the consuming was on his way to his cabin, where, by simply cancelling the non-permanent transfiguration on his clothes, he was soon once again wearing the dark uniform of his small group. Harry had just thrown the last bit of clothing into the corner to dress somewhat more comfortably when, without much warning and a decided lack of any knocking, his cabin door opened. He would definitely have to get a lock on there, as much was sure.

With a very intimidating, not at all ridiculous ‘Eeep’, the young wizard jumped behind the door of his closet, where he had been ruffling through his meagre possessions for something fit to be worn as sleepwear.

“Mercer is that you?” he grumbled menacingly; or as menacing as one could be, with their eyes already drooping. “I swear, if it is, I _will_ be showing Arden that stinging hex first thing in the morning.”

However, the response was not in the Imperial deserters sometimes jovial, sometimes bitterly serious voice; instead, it came in the form of a voice he should have been expecting to hear rather soon, though for some reason he had not.

“No, it’s me,” Leia Organa announced herself, managing to banish most of her mirth at Harry’s reaction from her tone. “I know you wanted to have some peace and quiet for a while, but I really nee… I mean wanted to see you were okay. Arden seemed to be delighted to send me here.”

“Of course, she was,” Harry replied, more commenting to himself than anything else.

“I can go, if you want to?” she ventured, though not even the sometimes emotionally inept man that was Harry Potter could miss the vulnerability. That would not do at all, for her to feel pushed away; he had come to save her more than anyone else, after all.

“Only if you come back in in, say two minutes,” he joked light-heartedly. Her mere presence had an immediate mood-lifting effect. “I’m not all that… clothed, right now.”

Hearing his door close once again, along with a quick ‘See you then,’ had Harry change into his sleepwear in record time, though he did do his best to choose something that would conceal more of him than what would be the norm; there was no point in being presumptuous, really. So, it came that he was already snuggled up under his blanket, barely able to keep his eyes open, when Leia once again entered his room. Now that he could really see her, it was once again obvious what kind of toll the last few days had taken on all of them.

Nevertheless, she had never been more beautiful to him than in that moment, as she smiled at him widely and ran to envelop him in a crushing hug that distantly reminded him of the ones that another brunette he had once known with equally fascinating hair had delighted in doling out. Yet, despite knowing of the possibilities Harry knew existed between him and Hermione (thanks to what he had seen during ‘the displacement’), this one felt very different for what actually was there already between him and Leia, even if he was patently unable to characterise, what exactly it was.

“I’m so glad you’re okay,” she mumbled into his chest, something that would most definitely take some getting used to; there were never that many people to hug him like that, and the one to do it most, Gryffindor’s resident whiz-kid, had first been taller than him, before he eventually caught up and ended up being around a hand’s width taller. So, someone reaching only to his chest was kind of a new experience; obviously, the fact that she was on his _bed_ and he was only in his pyjamas made the whole thing… different too.

Apparently though, Leia had more of a handle on what exactly she expected to happen, as she soon started settling in next to him. In fact, she had just about wiggled her way under the covers with him, when Harry stopped her.

“Uh, what’re you doing?” he asked with one raised eyebrow. “Not that I’m objecting, I’m just…”

“…clueless,” Leia finished for him, half-jokingly. “Don’t worry, we’re both too tired for anything, anyway. Let’s talk tomorrow. For now, I would just like to sleep here. It makes me feel safe.”

“Sure thing,” Harry replied with all the nonchalance he could muster, despite how much he too was looking forward to as relaxing a night as the last occasion in which he had served as a pillow to the Alderaanian princess had provided. “Would it be alright if a transfigure your clothes into something more comfortable.”

“Sure, why do you ask?” the already sleep-addled young woman replied, after she had finally managed to get under the covers and into the warmth.

“Well, it is kind of an invasion of privacy. My magic is a part of me, which would then be all over you…”

“I don’t mind, just do it.”

Her permission granted, Harry grabbed for his wand, always lying on his nightstand, and did his best to approximate what he thought was some modest sleepwear for women, not to mention fit for her size. Considering Leia was already nodding off and did not complain, it seemed to be fine.

“Night, you.”

“Good night.”


	25. Chapter 25

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: The Star Wars and Harry Potter copyrights lie with their respective owners, should any of them have any problem with my story being shared, I will comply with their wishes and remove it from circulation.  
> Please do not copy this work or any part of it.

“Hey, Boss, have you… ow, ow, ow! What the hell?”

“I warned you,” Harry grumbled at his first officer who, once again, had obviously felt it necessary to barge into the captain’s quarters. “Now I’ll show Arden everything she might ever need to annoy you.”

Wide-eyed, Mercer beat a hasty retreat, though not without wagging his eyebrows upon noticing the tangled hairs of Leia Organa lying upon the sole cushion, for larger the bed might have been, it was still primarily appointed for a single occupant. Luckily, both the people who had been sleeping in it were, at the most, average in size. Seemingly having gotten over her much-noticed tendency to blush oh-so prettily when found in a suggestive position with Harry, she simply rolled around until she could, once again, place her head on his shoulder.

“Maybe we should… talk?” the young woman with the somewhat tousled hair ventured; it would be enough to make the entire ship, if not the entire small flotilla gossip, were she to be seen like this. Having something concrete to tell everyone would definitely help matters. Still, being honest with himself, having something concrete to tell _himself_ seemed more important in that moment to Harry.

“That might be a good idea,” he agreed contemplatively. For him, at least, it was obvious what he wanted to have, between the two of them; emotionally inept he might have been, but a moron would have been going too far, either.

“Just so we’re on the same page, we… we like each other, right?” Leia clarified, her delighted smile at being pulled in closer to her human pillow speaking to her wish for that to be a true assessment of the situation.

“Sure seems like it,” Harry agreed wholeheartedly, letting his right thumb, hand lying lightly on her upper arm, stroke up and down. “So… will you be my girlfriend?”

“Absolutely, you dork,” Leia replied enthusiastically, all while shimmying up along his chest until she could press a small, gentle kiss to his cheek. “We seem to be doing things in a weird sequence, though. I already spent _two_ nights in your bed, how scandalous, and we’ve never even kissed properly.”

Conjuring on his face what he hoped would could be considered a mischievous smile, Harry softly laid a hand onto the back of her head and softly pressed his lips onto hers; it was a good kiss, though the idea of angels singing and fireworks going off were probably a bit… lofty a target to shoot for. Nevertheless, this brief contact of lips ramped up the young man’s heart rate and made everything, every little touch seem so much more intense.

“Boss!” the voice of Mercer Fenwick sounded through the door, accompanied by a couple of knocks. “The brass wants to see… well the two of you.”

“We’ll be out soon,” the wizard called back in response, squeezing Leia to his chest one last time. “Conference room, ten minutes.”

A loud acknowledgement on his lips, the first officer left, his heavy steps receding away from the door and down the corridor, probably toward the mess, if Harry’s experience with the man was any indication.

“Let’s see, what they want,” Leia muttered, already moving out of her position cuddled up to her boyfriend, immediately leaving the bed feel emptier, colder. “We can talk more later.”

Groaning, as much in jest as in real annoyance, Harry got up as well, waving his hand (conveniently including the ring with the crystal he had found on Dathomir) over the young woman, returning her clothes to the state they had been in the night before. Then, he waved it over himself to apply a generously powered personal hygiene charm before offering to do the same for her.

“What do magical people even have to do, really?” she mused as she visibly shuddered under the wave of magic flowing over her skin. “There seems to be a piece of magic for almost everything.”

“There probably is,” Harry conceded, even as he demurely relocated to the bathroom with his clothes for the day. “You just have to learn it; even then, it’s often not as satisfying as the real thing. A good shower beats a cleaning charm every time, as far as I’m concerned.”

“And a cleaning charm beats a standard fresher unit every time as far as _I_ am concerned,” Leia countered, loud enough to be just audible through the door, left slightly ajar to facilitate communication. “I’m just not a fan of those sonic showers.”

Having experienced these contraptions as well, just before he had done some extensive practice on his hygiene charms, Harry could only agree. Though, if the rumours one of the guards on the Death Star, whose mind he had invaded, had heard, were to be believed, they did not have to be. The Empire just did not spring for expensive, strategically unnecessary equipment for the common grunts. Or for corvette captains, for that matter.

“Then I’ll do my best to show it to you as soon as possible,” he offered as he stepped out of the refresher and into the main room once again. “Using magic all the time lets you get really used to it. At least that is the feeling I’ve been getting, since I got here; back home, as long as you were underage, you weren’t allowed to do magic outside of school, even though we actually got homewo… What are you doing?”

Without much warning, the young wizard had been enveloped in a warm hug, with Leia standing on the tips of her toes.

“This is…” she began, before faltering halfway through, taking a deep breath and beginning anew. “This can be your home, too, you know that? You have friends here, you are doing something meaningful, you’re appreciated, free. That is as much and more than what you had back there.”

Frowning, not sure how to sort out the feelings her observation evoked in him, Harry pulled back a little to look at the princess’ face. “Remember them, of course, but I think they would have wanted what was best for you. You’d be doing yourself and everyone around you a disservice by living in the past.”

Strangely touched by her concern (really, who else had been this concerned for him in the past, beyond maybe Hermione?), the young man intensified the hug again, tightening his hold on Leia’s small frame and pulling her against his chest; surprisingly, there seemed to be a few wet streaks on his cheeks.

“Your parents would be proud, I think,” she mumbled into his uniform jacket.

“Yours would be proud, too,” Harry said, still holding her close, only speaking to the crown of hair she had somehow managed to weave in the short span of time it had taken him to get dressed. “Let’s get to the conference room before they send Arden to get us.”

Reluctantly they parted, and Leia gave a sharp, encouraging nod, whose addressee he was not all that sure about before leading the way out of the captain’s quarters and toward the turbolifts, which quickly deposited them onto the command level. What awaited them in the conference room was a solid wall of Alliance brass (even though some of the gathered leaders were less than there, only appearing as holograms). The only important person that came to mind that stood out by their absence was actually Bal-Iblis.

“Captain Potter, Princess,” General Dodonna greeted formally, though his stiff delivery was somewhat belied at the genuine, if small smile gracing his lips. “We were hoping to learn a bit more about the events that led to all this.”

The general made a wide gesture, quite obviously alluding to how most of the Rebellion’s leadership had actually made it past the Empire’s blockade, against all odds. So, in appropriate fullness and appreciative of everyone’s contribution, Harry recounted their run-in with the rebel cell during their mission to rescue Palestro, their attack on the Imperial factory, their fight against the one who had called himself an inquisitor.

“You killed an Imperial Inquisitor?” Cracken inquired, the proverbial saliva almost dripping from his mouth. “Did you get anything from him? Data disks, commlinks, anything? A name?”

“Multiple lightsabres and a code cylinder,” Harry replied easily, more easily than he had thought he would; talking about someone he had killed should bother him more, he decided. “Never got a name though, sorry. Only that he was an Imperial Inquisitor; looked human, though.”

After some thinking he added, “I’ll let you have the code cylinder, but everything you learn using it has to be shared with us.”

“Deal,” Cracken jumped on it. Obviously, these Inquisitors were important enough to warrant not haggling over the price of one of their code cylinders. Or maybe, the sly dog hoped sharing intel with the crew of the _Lightbringer_ might point them into the direction of other, worthwhile targets that were a thorn in the Alliance’s side. Sly old dog, indeed.

“And you’re sure we can’t convince you to make a more substantial commitment to the Rebellion?” Mon Mothma interrupted, managing just the same tone of well-meaning interest and elder statesperson that had been such a staple of Dumbledore that it honestly rankled Harry a little. “Your unique skills have proven quite useful already, and your actions have shown that you are far from a friend of the Empire.”

“And joining the Alliance would mean fitting into a chain of command, with people having authority over me whose motives I don’t fully know,” he blurted out in defiance before he really knew, what exactly was going on; really, it had been more of a visceral reaction than anything else, spoken from the depths of his subconscious mind. It was probably even the main reason he had been holding out on joining up until this point, because really… not daring to care for too many people had seemed reasonable a few months ago, when it had just been Mercer, Arden, Javoc and Corsek. And Leia, obviously. Now though? There was an entire crew he cared for, felt responsible for.

“I don’t have the best track record with authority figures,” Harry offered as explanation for his outburst. “Fitting me into a military hierarchy would become quite messy, quite quickly.”

No one commented, though Leia did squeeze his hand a little (he had not even noticed they were still holding hands) and Cracken, though superficially unperturbed, had a calculating look on his face. If he knew people at all, the young wizard was sure the man would find a way around having him constrained into such a hierarchy if it meant gaining access to the unique asset he now seemed to represent.

“What of Beeth Va’lim?” the former senator from Chandrila finally spoke up, having given the uncomfortable silence some time to linger. “We have watched the recordings you have made of him and we agree with your actions. Still, he has to be held accountable by the actual authorities.”

Having expected this to come up, Harry was ready with an answer. “As long as he faces an impartial judge and stays away from me and my ship in the future, you can take him with you as soon as you leave the ship. He’s in something of a bad mood, though, has been cussing up quite the storm I’m told.”

That too went uncommented upon, save by Cracken, under whose mandate the special operations team probably fell, who simply nodded sharply. His face was wearing an expression as if he had just bitten into a particularly sour lemon. Still, Harry had a feeling the man would somehow be able to make some lemonade out of it.

“Well, in that case,” he said, now seemingly ready to serve the lemonade, “I would like to offer for the team to permanently join you. They won’t expect pay, as they’re being paid by us, just room and board, as well as any equipment you might wish to provide beyond that. Other than that, our previous arrangement continues as before: you do your thing, scour the galaxy for scum that needs bringing in, and send anything that’s interesting our way.”

A smile on his face, Harry shared a fond look with Leia before returning attention to the general. “I think that would be something we can agree on.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> AN: So, we have reached the end.  
> I hope you had even a fraction of the fun reading this one as I had writing it. For everyone who did and now wants to know how the story of Harry, Leia, Arden, Mercer and the others continues to unfold, fear not, for I am already working on the second book and will start publishing as soon as it is almost done, like I did with this one.  
> Only thing left for me to say is thank you to everyone who reviewed or sent me a PM (the helpful and/or uplifting ones, anyway) and wish you all a nice weekend.  
> alexandertheII


End file.
